


I.M.P; Intimate Messy Parentalhood.

by JormTheKomodo



Series: Intimate Messy Parentalhood [1]
Category: Hazbin Hotel (Web Series), Helluva Boss (Web Series)
Genre: Angst, Animal Transformation, Awkwardness, Bananas, Blitzo calls Luficer "bitch", Blitzo is Bad at Feelings (Helluva Boss), Cloaca, Cooking, Court, Cuddling & Snuggling, Dadsexuality, Depression, Drugs, Explosions, Fatherhood, Feelings, Gay, Hotel Sex, Inflation, Kissing, Komodo - Freeform, Love, M/M, Magic, Marriage Proposal, New around here so is likely missing lots of tags., Now with spacing, Rough Sex, Scents & Smells, Sex, Shooting Guns, Teenage Daughters, Trials, Violence, musk, relationship
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-03-17
Updated: 2021-03-18
Packaged: 2021-03-26 10:41:31
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 4
Words: 30,215
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30104709
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JormTheKomodo/pseuds/JormTheKomodo
Summary: A couple of years into the future of my personal head-canon. Blitzo gets woken up to the news that Stolas has exploded! Or, at the very least, his mansion has! The now midst-divorce Prince of Hell and his daughter arrive at the slummy Imp City complex and Blitzo has to make some choices regarding his future... and the lanky, kinky, tower of a twink boyfriend of his that is slumped into a silenent sleep of angst out in the parking lot...Expect lots of Dadsexuality, Dadvices and a sense of comedy literally raised from Hell. Gore, death and gayness around every corner.
Relationships: Blitzo & Stolas Goetia, Blitzo/Loona (Helluva Boss), Octavia Goetia & Loona, Octavia Goetia/Loona
Series: Intimate Messy Parentalhood [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2215200
Comments: 11
Kudos: 46





	1. Don't make me say it...

I.M.P: Intimate Messy Paternalhood. Chapter 1; Don’t make me say it…

“… oh fuck… oh FUCK!”  
In an instant, the lazy lycanthrope threw herself out of the living room couch and darted into an uncharacteristically panic-faced blur of gray fur and goth clothing. Had she not busted the lock to her adoptive father’s door enough times for him to stop bothering to replace it, she would have once more done damage to the frame and mechanism as she kicked the door open. “BLITZ!”

  
“Wha-aaaah!” The male imp, having just arrived after an exhausting day of chasing down a mortal jogger, jolted back to awareness with a start. Managing to fall out of his bed due to having collapsed on its very edge, still mostly clothed, saved from damage upon landing only by the graze of a larger horse plush dampening his fall. He bestowed said stuffed equine a bag-eyed look of adoration and gratitude, before turning his gaze tired but loving to his towering daughter. “What’s the matter, Loonie? I am a bit tired, so-“

  
“Stolas exploded!” Loona interrupted him, and it was only then and there that Blitzo noticed the rare distress on the female hellhound’s face. She paused with a frustrated groan, mumbling her cuss word of preference under her breath as she swiped across her phone for a few seconds, giving the now drained, confused AND concerned imp time to stand up. As he approached, she practically shoved her stylized phone into his face. Upon its screen was a local news story uploaded, with a looping video preview of a very recognizable hill… and dreadfully familiar rubble ruins marked the still-standing corners and the force of expulsion by being spread all over the grassy surroundings.

  
“What the actual… wait, his WIFE did this?!” Blitzo was still trying to make his brain function at semi-normal capacity, only able to make out the headlines and the first few eye-catching words of the smaller font text beneath.

  
“Via just texted me about it! She’s fine, and on her way here. She’ll stay at my room… yeah?” It had been a couple of years since Blitzo last saw his daughter give him that look, not to mention tone of voice… that will-filled and no-fears attitude of hers that had settled in her teenage years and endured into young adult had been so dominant, with the glimmers of her actual care and respect for him so dim and sparse. For the first time in however-long, she was neither forcing her own way and will, nor broodingly waiting for commands in an attempt to receive guidance without asking for it… she was actually looking to him with fear and fret in her voice, uncertainty and despair in her eyes. A true, honest desire for comfort and parental support.

  
“Absolutely! Take what you need, make sure she’s comfortable. What can I do?” The imp, taller than most due to how long he had managed to stay alive despite his social stature- something also shown on his larger-than-most’s horns, gave the canine a nod and confirming hand on her shoulder. Loona nodded, then nodded a few more times in rapid succession as she drew a steadying breath and let slip a rare smile of appreciation for her cooky father figure. Reassurance was something she at times took for granted from him, as he had spoiled her rotten over the years, but she always did appreciate it when he did… or tried. Even if it scared her to show it.

  
“Than-…” She started meekly, her words failing her as concern and a bit of guilt rose up though her throat, but when Blitzo gave her that tired, knowing smile she returned it with a quick grin and shake of her head. “Dork-hole… I’m taking the blankets, and I’ll order in dinner. Got cash at home?” She halted on her way out of his door to confirm the last question, thumb hovering over her screen as she had already begun to answer the avian on the other side.

  
“Yeah, yeah yeah yeah! I got some left here somewhere, curtesy of Stolas… What about him, by the way?” Blitzo turned into his room, starting to dig through pockets for the bills he knew he kept in one of them, somewhere. His guts somewhat awry with concern for the Prince of Hell. But when Loona did not respond, in her place only the rapid tapping of her screen, he did not ask twice.

“… hey, Loona…” Octavia, the goth-punk owl-demon, looked up as the door to the apartment opened. Her white-feathered face wore deeply sunken rivers from her eyes downwards, as tears up until what must have been minutes ago moistened and slicked the delicate fibres into canals. Her otherwise brightly pink eyes now almost as dark-red as her father’s, contrasting sharply against her still young and bright-white pupils. Loona, never one to stand on ceremony or display awareness of social classes, quickly approached and wrapped her powerful arms around the slender owl. Her shoulders being squeezed by clawed- yet careful hands, a jagged breath of relief and concerned released into her massive plume of hair-like feathers was all it took. Octavia began to sob uncontrollably as she hugged her friend back.

  
Blitzo stood in the frame of his door, watching through the living room from the corner of his eyes with great interest and anxiety, yet made not attempts to meddle. Loona had never said anything to him, but even before he once over-heard her speaking to Octavia about keeping it a secret from their dads, he had noticed the effects on his daughter by the feminine fowl’s presence. The way she would forget her hardened and darkened façade for a softened smile and occasional giggle whenever they were texting, or how her unspecified and no-reasons-given visits to local shops had increased since they were introduced. Blitzo was a jester, not a fool.

  
“B-Blitz…?” The sobbing Octavia’s voice made him snap back to reality, having not realized that he had been staring at an abandoned and left-open-door since the girls started moving to Loona’s room. He snapped his gaze to her, offering a wave and nod of sympathy as he answered.

  
“Heya, kid… I only just heard… How-… Do you-… shit… Sorry, I am only saying little because I’ll fuck up if I try more…” He averted his gaze. Anyone else and it would not have been an issue. He was a master at improv, if you asked him! But he had dedicated all of his softness to Loona, and not only had the daughter of his main patron reminded him of her immediately on so many levels, but she had since then also become important TO his daughter… it made him hesitant on so many levels… especially since he saw a lot of Stolas in her face.

  
“… heh… dickhead… Loona’s right about you, after all.” Octavia smiled through her tears, a sincere and approving smile that puzzled Blitzo for a moment and made Loona wide-eyed in horror over having their secret conversations hinted towards. “Dad in outsides, in the car. He-… I think you two should talk?” That part made the imp quickly bolt from his spot and march towards the apartment door, determination and unfocused worries radiating from his face as he swung his flintlock and holster over his shoulder with professional haste. He shot a quick “Thanks!” to the girls before dashing down the stairs, giving no thoughts nor time for the elevator.

Only when he exited the main door to the complex did it dawn on him how he was dressed, as the usual tic to double-check his impeccable attire before truly leaving kicked in. His black cowboy-esk leather boots, black suit pants, belt, white undershirt, shoulder holster and his lower-arm covering gloves… blood still on his boots from work, pants dusty from the chase, shirt wrinkled from running and crashing on his bed… He had neither jacket nor vest, not even his skull-choker… an unpleasant shiver shot through his spine and up into his neck, causing him to quickly shake his head to ignore and push through the internal screams of insecurities. But he had a goal of more pressing matters, parked across the street in yet-black and the length of his own complex… fucking limos…

Stolas shot an eye open at the sudden yanking on the locked car door’s handle by his feet- or, err, lower talons. It was quickly followed by a distant and outside-muffled series of cusses, before everything went silent and still again. Clenching his eyes- all four of them tightly shut in exhaustion and frustration, the feathered Prince of Hell let out a tensed sigh and attempted sleep once more. Had it even been five minutes since Octavia left, and already the peasants were trying their luck on his luxurious vehicle? It did not bode well for his already lacking amount of rest…

  
Then, a brief scratching sound… followed by a rising grunt, before a loud snap of mechanical components tearing! Metal grinding against uncooperative other metals, light from the still-bring sky above almost blinding the darkness-acquainted nocturnal’s four eyes, and a familiar voice proclaiming triumph!

  
“A-HAH! Fucking snob-designs, I swear! Never consider roof access!” Blitzo dropped into the- at least to him, immensely spacious limo through the now busted window mounted on the roof with all the theatrical graze and bravado of the former circus artist that he was. Giving a dramatic dusting of his gloves with a smug smile at his accomplishment, before immediately turning a dark glare towards the still blinking and adjusting Stolas. “Now what the fuck are you doing here, Stolas?” The imp folded his arms and pointed with the front one to the limo floor.

  
“I-… Excuse me? Are you…? What?” With the light aching in his sleep-deprived eyes, the slouching and lengthy owl demon attempted to glare at the accusive audacity of his favourite imp. “What I am doing in my own Limousine?! I was attempting to REST before you burglarized what little property and solitude I managed to escape with! My HOME has been reduced to a pile of smouldering RUBBLE, IF YOU MISSED THE NEWS?!” With every sobering word, the pent-up fears and frustrations in Stolas rose and intensified. The true horror and realization of what had happened- what WOULD happen still, finally settling in now that he was neither putting on bravery for his daughter nor being distracted by his own exhaustion.

  
“Yeah yeah yeah, I saw! And I didn’t mean that, I meant what you are doing down HERE! In your fucking CAR! Why didn’t you…!” As Blitzo lost his words in anger, something snapped in Stolas. He had just spent a week STRAIGHT being accused, criticized, blamed, scrutinized and quite literally PECKED ON for the OH so many flaws and imperfections that he APPARENTLY brimmed with, according to his wife! With a swift motion, the now perfectly wide-eyed in raging fury demon retracted and then shot forth one of his immensely long and lanky legs! From outside, only a passing-by Imp child- curious about the exotic machine parked in his poor neighbourhood, saw three razor-sharp talon shoot through the bullet-proof window on the passenger door! Blitzo’s head almost crushed between the vice of the Hell-Prince and the pressure of the cracked glass!

  
“Why… did I… not… WHAT?!” Stolas roared, as the feathers of deep black and gray across his body began to shudder and rise. His hands grasping at the car’s interior, claws sinking into the expensive leathers and interior as he dragged himself into a sitting position. Eyes so intense with emotion and magical energies that they emitted visuals akin to flames as if they ventilated excessive and uncontrolled power. “TELL ME, IMP! TELL ME WHAT I SHOULD HAVE DONE, WITH YOUR INFINATE WISDOM! YOU, WHO CANNOT EVEN MANAGE A LOWLY BUSINESS WITHOUT MY BOONS! YOU WHO ARE UNFIT TO TYPE OUT A PHOTOGRAPHY COMMENT! LET ALONE CARE FOR- OR BE IN CHARGE OF OTHER LIVING BEINGS! TELL ME, YOU WHO HAVE RUINED MY LIFE FOR ME! WHAT DO YOU-“

  
Interrupted by Blitzo’s hands removing themselves from his leg, having struggled against his grip in futility, they instead went lower to his own person. Grabbing, and pulling out hist flintlock pistol from his holster. Stolas knew the gun well. He had personally gifted it to Blitzo over a year ago, after finding out the imp had a preference for the older and more sophisticated firearms of its ilk. He always wore it, always carried it with him, and Stolas had many a times commented on it… sometimes lewdly, sometimes not, but always with the honesty of finding the weapon a dashing detail on his roguish lover… but now? Seeing it pulled without joke or flirtation, without posing or humour… did he intend to… Stolas’ talons began to cut through the glass as his grip tightened, causing Blitzo to scream through gritted teeth.

  
“… are… you… threatening… ME…?!” Stolas registered a loss of control, and a loss of… care? Here and now, without the ability to consider five minutes from then, he didn’t mind permanently erasing the Imp who had caused him so much grief… so much loss… made him a spectacle for all of hell! He could so easily end it all, he could so easily-

“F-Fuck, you…” Blitzo sneered, eyes half-closed from strain and agony, as he quickly raised the gun to his own exposed temple. Immediately, Stolas’ eyes widened. Colour draining from both the hate-radiant purple peepers of his and the skin beneath his feathers. Absolute and utter terror sized him for a moment- but a second of non-movement and silence, completely eradicating all of his angers and hatred. During that second, images upon images flashed by his inner eye… of himself, sitting on his knees and trying to piece together the shattered remains of his beloved’s head in utter disbelief and regret. Of him trying every spell in his arsenal, despite knowing it impossible to resurrect hell-born the same way Sinners will over time. Of the realization that the last words to the man who held his heart would have been unfairly directed anger and low blows from bottled fury the Imp had not disserved…

  
“Bl-“ Stolas could not finish the name, his beak seizing to function the moment he noticed the imp’s finger moving. Realizing he still held Blitzo in a dying grip- the slightest extra pressure likely to pop his head completely or crush his cranium into his brains. His breath suddenly felt like ice, as he attempted to throw himself forward to stop the white-specked little demon whilst also releasing him, opening his beak in terror to utter his name again- before he felt the heat of gunpowder and the pressure of the combustion against his retracting talons. Before his eyes, the last he saw of Blitzo’s face- the face of the man he would even give up his reputation and gamble his throne for, was a contortion of pain and eyes of desperate anger… as the eruption from the custom-made firearm made it all vanish in sparks and smoke…

“-aaak!” A serious of coughs and groans followed, as Blitzo sunk to the limo floor. One of his massive hands rubbing his somewhat bean-formed head, the other rapidly waving to disperse the smoke and fumes. “Christ, and I thought Loona without weed on her period was feisty..! You just set a new fucking record… fuck…” The imp continued to massage his noggin, giving the lame-struck, shaking and unbreathing Stolas a glare of annoyance.

  
“Y-You… BLITZY!” How the Owl managed to completely warp down to- and around him, Blitzo would never truly know. But faster than any eye could track, Stolas materialized on his knees with arms wrapped around the imp. His feathered form shaking violently from a deeply disturbed breathing pattern, tears rolling down from all four of his eyes as he squeezed the beloved little red demon tightly. “Ne-Never EVER d-dare to pull a t-trick like that again! Do you hear me?!” He demanded, nuzzling his beak against the thin neck of the smaller male. Blitzo, in turn, slowly wrapped his arms around Stolas as well. Replying after a few seconds with a calm, apologetic voice.

  
“I’ll try not too… “ He sighed into the exposed feathers of the royalty, gently rubbing his claws across and into the heaving back of his towering benefactor. “… I didn’t mean to accuse you… you know, when I came in… and I was only in a hurry because I… fuck, I didn’t… I didn’t know, okay?”

  
Stolas paused, his breath having stabilized enough for him to lean back to look Blitzo in the face.  
“What was it you did not know…? You said you knew of my home-“

  
“No! I mean, YES! I knew about- I THOUGHT I knew! Fuck…” Blitzo took a moment to close his eyes and force himself calm, with an uncharacteristic tenderness and concern in his voice. “… I didn’t know if you… were alive… alright…? All I knew was that your shit got nuked by your vengeful bitch of a wife, that I had your daughter in tears on my door and no information on YOU until SHE said you were down here! You didn’t call- fucking TEXT me to tell me that crazy coocoo-cunt didn’t flambé you! That you were okay… and down HERE when I live ten fucking meters above…”  
Stolas grew wide-eyed, witnessing for the first time in over a year of having known- and gone through SO MUCH with Blitzo, the Imp starting to cry. Tears welling up in his eyes, threatening surrender to gravity, as the large and gloved hands tightened their pressure against the owloid’s fluffy back.

  
“… Blitzy… I… forgive me, I… I am at a loss for words… “ Stolas seldom found himself so truly robbed of his gift of gab. Internally, he was an emotional mess. Never before had he felt such simultaneous joy and flattery; that Blitzy would be that concerned for his health and well-being… whilst also raked across his heart with guilt over the unforgivable things he spat in anger… “… I… I was partly pre-occupied, as much is true. It is not every day a mansion spanning generations of royalty gets destroyed by a marital disagreement… however, I did make the conscious decision to not bother you, as I am very well aware that is how most of my calls are received by you… bothersome.”

  
“Since when did THAT stop you…?” Blitzo raised an eyebrow, seemingly trying to WILL his tears back into his increasingly radiant eyes as the evening darkness began to settle outside.  
“Blitzy, dearest… If I am a bother to you even when I make the calls all about my longing for you, what would I not expect to be when I am exhausted, homeless and in such a state?” Stolas chuckled lowly with a hint of sorrow, a hint that cut deep into Blitzo with guilt.

  
“Fucking hell, Stolas… it is the petty shit that annoys me! That and… well… b-but not the fucking important stuff!” Blitzo attempted to glare angrily at Stolas, but choking back both the tears AND the sudden darkening blush on his cheeks proved too much a multi-task, making him fail slightly at both. Stolas, in turn, softened with a moved expression on his face. Slowly leaning forward until he could lean his forehead against the imp’s.

  
“I shall carry that in mind, then. Apologies, and thank you, my dear Blitzy…”

  
“Tch… y-yeah, yeah… whatever… now let’s get out of this car before all this rich-ass decoration makes a snob out of me too!” Blitzo coughed as he released himself from the hug, turning to locate the thinga-ma-bob that unlocked the door from within. Stolas, however, only lifted himself back onto the seat. An honest smile on his beak, if sorrow in his eyes.

“Blitzy… The reason we came here is because Octavia wished to spend the night with your darling Loona, otherwise I would not have bothered you.”

  
“Neither call NOR visit? Damn, Stolas, a girl might think you have more side-chicks…” Blitzo seemed to only half-listen, as his forked tongue slipped between his sharp teeth. Stolas only then and there noticed that the imp had pulled out some kind of hair-pin from somewhere and was in the end-game of lockpicking the car-door from the inside, succeeding with disturbing ease a second later. “Then let me re-phrase my original question… the hell did you stay down here in your CAR if Octavia convinced you to come over here?”

  
“Because she intended to sleep in your apartment- and I did notice she did not follow you out, so I am assuming you permitted her request, of which I am thankful. However, for as much as I have confidence in your aim and protective nature, it would not feel right to leave her here and venture off to one of my other estates.” Stolas conjured himself a glass of iced water, if nothing else than to combat the rising migraine now that his emotional rush had settled and re-introduced him to his drained state. Blitzo sighed and ran a hand across his face.

  
“That is dandy and all, and yeah of course I let her sleep over! I’d be a shit dad if I didn’t let my daughter’s girlfriend crash every now and then.” Blitzo realized the moment he said it- and because of Stolas’ sudden sobering and spluttered coughing, that he might have been the only one of them to realize the secretive relationship between their daughters. Not wanting to derail the conversation, he ignored Stolas’ wheezing attempts to comment and question. “ANYWAY! My point was why YOU stayed HERE instead of coming UP alongside her! You’ve been to my home before, I don’t get why you would stay in the CAR like some… I dunno, what ARE those mutated fly-things called that people have for pets these days?” Blitzo made a frustrated gesture from forgetting the name of the recently trending pet creature, his own lengthy work-day catching up with him again.

  
“I- do not think I am to forget the ‘girlfriend’ thing! But to answer… We made a deal, remember…? Once per month, YOU come to ME… everything else is to be done on YOU desire and invitation so that you may have personal space? Besides… you have never expressed much concern about me or… us, before. I honestly did not expect you to worry to this extent, or even forget the details of our agreement. I am bound by my deals, Blitzy, as are-“

“OH FOR FUCK’S SAKE!!!” Blitzo suddenly roared, his face angled at the roof of the car with arms straight by his sides. He quickly marched up to Stolas and stepped in between his legs after forcing the lanky things apart with the same lack of personal boundaries as when agitated in bed, causing Stolas to fluster slightly. “You KNOW me, Stolas! I talk a lot, but I am not a man of words! I am not a man great at speaking my mind on complicated or emotional shit… I am a man of ACTION! So you sit HERE and OBSERVE my ACTIONS! Got it?!”

  
Despite their obvious differences in powers… where as Blitzo was immune to fire and could control some lesser pyrokinesis- not to mention his prowess with mortal weapons, Stolas could literally kill with a glare or upturn entire cities if given a moment to cast. Yet, for some reason, this unique flavour of anger upon the so often snarky and bitter little imp felt… intimidating. As if that little finger and claw of his, pointed (most rudely by etiquette) directly at Stolas was, in actuality, the finger of Lucifer himself and the powers he commanded. Stolas could but nod, watching in confusion as the imp kicked the unlocked limo door open and darted out across the road. Vanishing into his apartment complex for less than a minute, before kicking the entrance door to the building open again. Now panting, possibly from running up and down several stairs in record time, he was also holding a most familiar and quite massive book under his right arm.

  
Seeing his Grimoire in the grip of a heavily frustrated Blitzo, Stolas felt his heart sink. Why would he have fetched it? What did he intend- or think he would do with it? COULD do with it? He wasn’t going to- surely not…? But then… he would have deserved it, would he not…? After the things he said, the thresholds he crossed… He had almost killed Blitzo moments ago, and almost made his last moments in life being told he was an illiterate and unfit parent, an incompetent business owner and employer… all the things Blitzo took such joy and pride in, despite his shortcomings and struggles… Stolas felt his beak shiver slightly, as he watched Blitzo approach with burning anger in his now fully luminant eyes. A white light began to crawl up his form from the left, accompanied by the sound of an approaching car. Furious glare mounted onto Stolas, Blitzo simply pulled his flintlock with his free hand and used his tail to quickly pack one of his specialized bullets into it, before firing it two seconds after pulling it at the approaching vehicle. Two loud bangs filled the street; one from the firearm and one from the blown-out tire, causing the car to screech past Blitzo at an off angle and crash into a streetlight a short distance down the road… Jumping into the limo, Blitzo still heaved slightly from his brief cardio before throwing the blue-covered book at Stolas.

“Stolas! I hearby END our fucking deal! On the basis that it is NOT satisfactory anymore! There’s your fancy-ass book back, so now I don’t HAVE it or can USE it, so I have nothing I need to OFFER you for it anymore! The deal is DONE!” He paused to pant, glaring angrily at Stolas who looked back at him with great heartbreak and distress, once more hesitant on what to say… until Blitzo took a deep breath, closed the car door and walked over to the small drink cooler within the limo. The calmness and elegance in his motions were… alarming, if not intriguing. Stolas knew Blitzo never said no to a drink, or had any issues allowing himself to one if kept nearby… but the manner of which he did it? Pulling out two champaign glasses and- adorably, a bottle of red wine despite the glass type…? He turned around and approached Stolas once more, extending a glass to the avian demon with a forward bow as he uncorked the flask behind his back with his horns! A trick new but impressive for Stolas, despite its juvenile crudeness. As he poured them each a serving, unceremoniously putting the flask on the floor when done with it, he seated himself next to Stolas. He took a sip from the whine, actually tasting and appreciating it for once, rather than just chugging…

  
“Nice book you have there. I couldn’t help but notice it would be the do or die for my business… I’d be willing to offer you a fair bit for it, if you’d be willing to share it?” Blitzo looked at Stolas with a perfectly straight face and business professional voice. The wide-eyed literal four-eyes, taken by both the sudden mood-change and… roleplay…? Well, he could but nod and take a, he admitted, MUCH needed sip of wine himself… realizing he was tired enough to consider the entire bottle after a mere taste of the buzzing beverage. “Swell! So. I have done my research, and I know you recently had that big blue book of your rented out for a specific set of returned favours. I am prepared to offer you those same circumstances, but I am willing to sweeten the pot for a total of; Monthly obligatory date and fucking, daily hour-long phone-call… and sharing my home for however long you feel the fucking need? Oh! And here’s a special offer for you! Order now, and you’ll get a weekly meeting at the shooting range as well for free!”

  
Blitzo smirked, even if there was a nervous hint to his eyes. Nevertheless, he extended his right hand to Stolas, who could but blink and try and process everything that happened. The emotional roller-coaster of fears and confusion and joy… the truly business-savvy and charming side of Blitzo seldom seen since their one first meeting that explains how he managed to get started at ALL with ANYTHING… and, what had he said? The monthly meet-up, the calls… and had he offered Stolas to… move in? At least for now? And go shooting with him on a weekly basis…?

  
“… Stolas, I am not a man of words…” Blitzo sighed at the silence and closed his eyes, hand slightly lowered but still extended. “Words hurt more than any spear or bullet, even I am smart enough to know that by experience… It is why I rather do, than say… and why most of WHAT I say is always bullshit and sass. It keeps the prudes away and filters out those with rough skin… or those who can read my actions… please, Stolas… read my actions here…”

  
The final words made Stolas’ chest shake as if struck by some force, due to his breathing briefly turning irregular. He had often speculated, even hoped for this to be the case… but never actually expected Blitzo to be so self-aware of his behaviour and his signals. Let alone be willing to plead and practically beg someone to not misunderstand him… express concern that there might BE one to begin with, and him not wanting there TO be… He speaks through actions…

  
He shows up on time… in or out of costume, if asked of him… he is willing to put himself at risk both within the company and outside the company, to ensure his company. In how many ways had he not risked his life to first acquire the Grimoire? How many of Stolas’ scandalous propositions had he not gone through with, just because he was asked? Not ordered, not demanded or blackmailed or threatened… just asked. It corresponded with a lot of Blitzo’s life, actually. The way he adopted a Hellhound as his daughter… not a slave, servant or pet, as per the norm… but as a Daughter. A person. A family. The same way he kept describing the two littler imps under his employ, and how he kept finding way in keeping them employed despite constant squabbles and their own shortcomings performance-wise. By Bethlehem, he was even a darling with Octavia! Never rude to her, always open and kind in his own way… and seemed more alert, aware and accepting on things that had gone even Stolas by… And now, here he was… offering Stolas as much access to his private home as the royal could desire. Not because he NEEDED a place to stay, he had other houses… but because it had worried and bothered BLITZO to not know about his health and whereabouts…?

“Oh… Blitzy…” Stolas began to tear up. His sob-starched voice of realization made the imp look away with a harsh blush on his face, wagging his hand profusely with an annoyed face that refused to meet that of the owl’s.

  
“Yes or no, Stolas?!” Blitzo noticed movement to his side and instinctively turned his eyes to analyse it, as lengthy arms enveloped him at a slow tenderness seldom seen in the avian. With a mayhaps more literal than metaphorical feather-light touch, Stolas’ fingers tenderly cupped the imp’s shoulders as the rest of the towering royal leaned closer. The gingerly hug he now found himself in rocked Blitzo’s façade. He felt pressure behind and beneath his eyes, as well as across his lungs as if he was being squeezed… but he knew Stolas barely touched him. If anything, he handled him like the most delicate of crystal glass. For all his bravado and attitude- a necessity amongst most imps to minimize the damage to one’s mentality and character from constant threats and injustices, even Blitzo could not fool himself in that moment. He recognized the feeling swelling from within him all too well, he had just not felt it in years… and hoped to never DO again…

  
“… fucking snobby dip-shit bird-dick… horny, rich, bastard asshole… cheating, imp-fucking bird-brain…” As he slowly turned to wrap his own hands around Stolas in return, feeling the tears of the towering patron drip down onto his back and spikes, he cursed lowly under his breath. It was all he could do to try and control his breath, to desperately try and now show weakness and softness… whilst at the same time plaguing his inner self for being the coward. Due to the surreal anatomy of the afterlife, the lesser demon’s hands were wider than the entire rib-cage of the spiring greater one. Normally, in consideration to their usual activities together, it had never bothered Blitzo. It made the lanky power-bottom easier to grab, hold and climb when needed… but for the first time, he wished the regal avian had a larger back-surface for him to stroke. All he could do was to not curl his fingers completely as he ran a hand across the spine of the quivering prince, lest the motion turn suggestive and lewd. Though subconsciously he made a mental note…

  
“I know… Blitzy… I know what you mean…” Stolas spoke softly, and the imp could practically feel the gentle smile of understanding on the feathered face. It made him shiver. Burrowing his face into the rich chest-puff of soft feathers, hoping they would absorb his tears as they escaped his control, his other hand shot up behind Stolas and grabbed him over the shoulder and arm. He continued to stroke the commander of hell’s legions for comfort, but he felt an urge to desperately hold on to his lover- his patron(!) lest his strength fail him… Of course the bastard had to see through him… smug, appreciative, generous, self-blaming, hard-working, soft…

The two sat like so for a moment longer. Simply holding and soothing each other, basking in their shared exhaustion and support for another. Before Blitzo took a steadying breath and slowly slid back. Not enough to dislodge himself from the lanky arms of the now collapse-ready avian, but enough to stand on the seat at near face-to-face height. He nodded, before turning to the Grimoire next to Stolas’ chopstick-like legs. He reached for it- his gaze coaxed in something Stolas could only interpret as mournful, before tucking the book under his arm and returning his gaze to the Prince. One of the imp’s massive hands reached up to cup the owl-like cheek of Stolas, slightly pressure pulling the head down to perfect equality with his own.

  
“Down payment for the deal, asshole.” He said with a face split in meaning; a frustrated frown on his lips, yet a blushing and focus on cheeks and eyes… before he pulled Stolas in for a kiss. It was not the first time the two had kissed, but Stolas soon realized it was the first time the two had… kissed… it was neither unusual for their lips to meet, nor for Blitzo to take control during their nights of passion. But Stolas’ realization dawned on him at the same speed of which his appearance doubled in size from feathers standing on end…

  
He had never experienced a kiss like this before… he had read about such kisses in his many novels and scriptures of the less intellectually challenging kind, but never truly thought of as more than glorification and elaboration. The kisses he had shared with his wife over the years had been fewer than his fingers, and quick pecks of ceremonial affection. Void of emotion or longing, of desire or passion. The kisses he had shared with Blitzo, however, had certainly been emotional. All from the early awkward ones due to their different anatomies, to the ‘will this make you shut up’ kisses of frustration from Blitzo’s side or the ‘how deep is your throat’ kisses from Stolas’…  
But this?

The fork-tipped tongue of the Imp moved with grace and reverence… a tender affection and trust in its message, as it gingerly sought its way past the flexible beak and- with some hesitation, nudged against Stolas’ own tongue. The scenery playing out in his own mouth, based on the tender physical responses, gave Stolas an inner visual representation of a caring canine approaching a slumped-over member of its pack. Uncertainly, but caringly, nuzzling the side of its kin to check on it and express concern… before he knew it, Stolas’ own tongue responded with familiarity yet caution. His own tongue slowly rising to reply the pressure, feeling the presence of his imp both though both the light pulse of his organ as well as his slightly coffee-dashed taste.

  
This was no struggle for dominance or exploration or limits, like two beasts in competition and curiosity. The sensation filling the now closed-eyed Stolas’ mouth was more akin to two cats leaning and stroking themselves against each other. Their liquid forms melting and merging against one and other, exchanging and sharing heat, trading and receiving scents in a primal display of trust and affection. A message so primitive and instinctual that the scholar almost struggled to translate it from his lacking experience with such subtle and forgotten means of communication… but as he began to moan into the mouth of his sharp-toothed lover, his tears swelled up once more at the letters and message being edged into his soul. “I will carry you, if you will carry me”.

  
Their hands began to caress the head of the other, akin to that the tails of beasts would coil and stroke one and other out of a desire to hold on longer- to guide and invite their partner back into their embrace… carnal willingness, primitive openness and signal for continuation. Stolas shivered… his imp had been holding out on him… but it suited him. An imp of action over words, indeed…  
As the air began to carry whiffs of escaped musk and the scent of arousal, the two demons finally came to a halt. Panting in different rhythms into the small space between them, breathing in the breath and essence of the other with a shared will for more, only tempered into restraint by adult knowledge of further steps risking escalation. They stared at each other… their eyes angled directly into those of the other, but they did not register the eyes themselves. Stolas’ intellectual mind was racing against the many newly erupted geysers of discovery, trying to understand and analyse them all, as was his nature in all things.

  
He was filled with longing like never before… yet, he was also fine with them not going further than this? He craved nothing else than the imp in his hands- the prime specimen that held him back with honest lust and desire all over his face… yet… there were no need for sex…? How could they spend the entire night fucking like animals in heat, again and again, position after position, glorious climax after glorious climax until they were reduced to nothing but sticky piles of radiant afterglow… and still, here, feel no need for any of it? As if the act would almost be… sacrilege? And wasn’t THAT an ironic thing in of itself! Two demons electing to NOT engage in sex during a moment of passion, because doing so would sully the borderline spiritual purity on a hedonistic level?

Stolas began to chuckle, tears still dripping across his smiling face.  
“You… never ceases to amaze me, my dearest Blitzy…” He cooed happily, a sound he could not recall when he did out of joy like so, rather than ecstasy or arousal. Their foreheads met, as Blitzo chuckled back between jagged breaths.

  
“Bitch, I am no one-trick pony…” He smirked, gently scratching the avian’s neck and head with one hand, resting the other on his bony shoulder with a gently massaging grip. Stolas giggled- GIGGLED, he realized as he did it, in response… It made him blush beneath his feathers, as he could not recall having ever giggled at anything. Laughed, snickered, chuckled… even guffawed once or twice since getting to know and spending time with Blitzo, but never been so compliantly happy, content and soothed in combination with amused that he would giggle… he felt… younger, in that moment. Younger than he had felt in hundreds of years. For a moment he marvelled over the effects his dear imp had on him, and how it reinforced yet again his decision before his wife…

  
“Now…” Blitzo continued. “How about we haul our asses up to the apartment before our daughters start getting ideas…? If we’re lucky, Loona’s yet to actually put in the order for delivery. I doubt I have much at home that’d suit your fancy taste.” Stolas let out a short laughter at that, opening his maroon eyes to look into Blitzo’s headlights in the dark.

  
“I am extruding great effort to not make a flirtatious comment there, Blitzy…”

  
“Shuddup… Because of that, YOU’RE paying!” Blitzo smirked, raising a hand to tap Stolas on the beak with the tip of a claw, causing the avian to chuckle under his breath.

  
“Fair enough. Shall we, my little Kichōna hōseki?” Stolas smiled warmly as he extended a hand and opened the door on his side of the limo, stepping out. Blitzo made an attempt to follow, before realizing he had dropped the book during their kiss and not realized it. Quickly turning back around to pick it up, he heaved it under his arm and followed Stolas out.

  
“… what did you call me? A kinky what? Did you just speak fluent fancy-speech?”

  
“Hah! Fitting, but no… it is Mandarin, Blitzy.”

  
“… like the fruit?”

  
Stolas didn’t reply to that, rolling his eyes with the dopiest of smiles on his face.


	2. At least explain it?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> First day after Stolas and Octavia crashed at Casa Blitz. Now that everyone has calmed down a little, it is time to consider options and solutions... and Blitzo is never one to shut up when it comes to stepping up. Especially not in his OWN house! Expect some tenderness, dad-brutal explanations, magic, neighbours and awkward clothing. Maybe even a quick romp on the sofa, who knows...

I.M.P: Intimate Messy Parentalhood. Chapter 2; At least explain it?

“No… no… NO, fuck no! No… Nooo… God damnit Moxxie, NO! Now take your fucking day off and we’ll be business as usual tomo- YES I got the fucking book! NO it was NOT stupid, you baby-brain cake-maker! I did it because Stolas needed-“ Blitzo turned around. Both hands struggling with pulling up and belting his trousers, his phone haphazardly pinned between a naked shoulder and his tilted head. Stolas had apparently awoken by his increasingly annoyed and loud tone, looking back to him with eyes and feathers that spoke of lacking awareness from a jolted stir. The lanky bird-demon looking almost new-born with his messy tufts and spirals of avian fluff, not to mention achieving to never blink simultaneously with any of his four eyes. “… B-Because shut up. Office tomorrow, 8 sharp and daggers sharper.”

  
“Brtzy…?” Stolas scrunched his face in an attempt to focus, yet his chirping mumble made it evident that he was far from at his full awareness. Blitzo, in turn, had just ended the call with an abrupt grunt-effect from his phone and a sigh. Refusing to look right at the scenery splayed out over- across- and around his bed at a fear of acknowledging it as adorable. The Prince was over twice the height of Blitzo, who already was rather tall for an Imp. Making the apartment and furniture comically small and unsuited for the royal. Who, in a shut-eyed stupor, began patting the spot on the mattress next to him. “… Bzzy?” He questioned in a concerned manner, making the imp cover his face with a large and bared hand. Begging Lucifer for strength before replying.

  
“Yeah, yeah, I’m here. Just getting my pants on… had to call ‘Martyr and Mayhem’ and tell them work’s off today. Hissy-fitting little bastard… You look like shit, by the way.” Blitzo smirked as he eyed the now peculiar face of the towering avian. All eyes still closed, making the slimmer upper pair near invisible amongst the dark plumes, whilst rendering the larger ‘true’ ones little but dark lines on a white face. It made him look like one of those emoticons, kinda. His white face being very heart-shaped from the front due to his stylized plume bangs, with two horizontal black lines for eyes- the black spine of his beak as a lined nose and small mouth at the blackened peak of his beak. Like a bored face on a washed-out heart… Which suddenly felt a bit all too real for the imp.

  
“Mmm… s’no wrrrk?” Stolas’ bird-like nature shined through once more as he chirped on his words in tired stupor, Blitzo could but nod and give an affirmative- and a little too high-pitched than intended grunt through his nose. “Splnd’d… c’mere…” With a crude and unfocused wave of his hand, Blitzo felt himself tossed across the small room on a waft of magical energies… alongside many lose items and floor-scattered clothing articles. He barely had time to react or open his mouth for an angry retort when he impacted face-first into Stolas’s chest. The untamed plume of chest-feathers threatening to seep through like liquid between his sharp teeth, causing him to just grumble in protest as lanky arms wrapped around him like a child would a plush toy. The two falling back onto the pillows with a relaxing coo from Stolas.

  
“… you get ONE more hour, you spoiled silver-spooner…” The imp mumbled, knowing he would not get a response from the already clocked-out royal yet still waiting a minute before shifting. He had always struggled to show affection- TRUE, affection… Doing so scared him, as he recalled what openly expressing admiration and feelings for others had earned him back at the circus. What it had earned his sisters… However, the day prior had shaken him badly as well. He had never thought it possible to fear losing Stolas, at least not in THAT way… He had been close to losing Stolas as a benefactor before… and as a friend. Not to mention lover. But last night was the first time he had considered the Prince of Hell mortal. After all, the old bird was not only protected politically and economically by being ROYALTY of the AFTERLIFE, but his mastery of magic and the mystical arts rendered him a powerhouse with few equals. He was not the commander of Hells Armies and the right-hand man of Lucifer himself without reason… but…  
He quivered.

  
Quietly and carefully, Blitzo slid his disproportionate hands in under the gangly body of the sleeping owl-demon. Claw-tipped fingers of red and spotted white gently curling around the shoulders and upper arms of the feathered figure, seizing them in a tender but shaky grip. Without a sound, only mouthing the words, Blitzo kept repeating “please don’t wake up, please don’t wake up, please don’t wake up” in a pleading inner voice. Tears that he already planned to claim being drool started wetting the rich mass of chest-feathers as he burrowed his face deeper in them, taking comfort in the familiar scent of fruit, papyrus and Stolas’ personal scent.

The night prior, after they left the limousine, had been cut short for all parties involved.  
Loona had managed to calm down Octavia to a point of standard- if concerned point of social capability. She and Stolas had spoken very briefly and efficiently- both avoiding any questions or gestures unrelated to the topic at hand, seemingly out of shared knowledge that it could start an avalanche neither were in a state to handle. Stolas had simply asked if Octavia still wished to spend the night there, and his daughter had stated that she did. Asking in turn if Stolas was fine holding out at the same location for a while. Which he was.

  
After that, they had shared a tired but appreciative smile, before both were guided to the individual rooms of their individual partners and collapsed. Stolas thankful that his daughter had not started a fuss over what had happened, after she had calmed down enough to digest matters… Octavia thankful that her father had not questioned why she wanted to be with Loona of all people at the time. Of course, whilst the roof was fine for Octavia- who was only slightly taller than Loona, Stolas had to walk with a terrible posture to not risk bumping into lamps and frames. The prince having wasted no time to unceremoniously dematerialize the clothes straight off his body upon the bedroom door closing behind him, before collapsing forward onto the large-for-an-imp-sized bed. Blitzo, being exhausted as well, had followed his lead out of habit. Stripping down into his birthday suit and laid down next to the owl…

  
Where as Stolas seemed to sleep peacefully, Blitzo had suffered nightmares. One after another with the same outcome. Maybe it was all the running the day prior to chase down that jogger target, but his dreams had him running through Imp City against the clock to reach Stolas’ mansion. Sometimes he would have to race the long-legged wife of the Prince; Stella, but would always lose and be forced to witness Stolas and his home explode in front of him. Other times he was forced to face the white-dominant female in combat, but when he pulled his gun it fired blank… with her laughing and whispering his own secret mantra on firearms back to him, before taking and using his gun as a flint to ignore a fuse… It had been his dreams that finally snapped him to consciousness, rather than the alarm he had forgotten to set. Realizing the time, he had rushed to put on his trousers out of habit whilst hoping it was not too late to call Moxxie and Millie.

  
They had left home by the time he got through to them, but they had thankfully not gotten to the office yet. Otherwise Moxxie would have raised a stink like there was no tomorrow… Of course, by then both of them had just learned of Stolas’ mansion from the published papers and had a hundred questions to bombard their boss about… a thousand after he explained what had happened and how he had gambled the book to solve a misunderstanding. Or, as Moxxie had called it:  
“Did you have to risk our JOBS just to woo your, your… your SUGAR-DADDY?!”  
  
Blitzo had taken offense to that. Not because he hadn’t done it, or the fact that Stolas’ patronage being a favour-for-sex transaction could very well summarize him as a sugar-daddy… No, the reason Blitzo resented the statement was because, at the time, he couldn’t think of any other way to show how he felt and comfort Stolas. Make him comprehend his value in the eyes of the imp, and that he was willing to risk his business to get that message across! Hell, Blitzo is a clever entrepreneur! Had it gone to shits, he could think of a thousand different company ideas! Maybepossiblymostlikely…  
  
  


“… you two done putting prostitutes out of work?” Loona’s verbally manifested smugness drilled through Blitzo’s half-asleep thoughts the way only a daughter’s presence to her father doing something embarrassing could, making him shoot his head up like a startled deer. At some point he had stopped crying, and whilst he could feel the salty residue still when he moved his facial muscles, he was thankful that nothing was visible. He could blame any swelling or redness of his brightly yellow eyes on a lack of sleep, but moist cheeks would have been obvious. Any other day he would rebuke her on any comment hinting towards his fraternizing with Stolas, but in that instance he- almost subconsciously, chose to roll with it rather than divert his daughter’s attention. Lazy or not, her canine senses and keenness was on point…

  
“Didn’t have much choice, dear… Besides, did you wake up differently?” He shot her a mile-long smirk, one that sharpened when he noticed the fur on her neck rise and eyes widen slightly for the briefest of seconds, before she covered it up with a snarl and slammed the door shut. That, in turn, finally woke Stolas up! Jolting into a sitting position with unnatural ease, despite having his imp lover still clutched tightly against his chest, only to fail turning his head around as instinctually intended due to his short beak still managing to get clefted between Blitzo’s horns.

  
“… Where-…” Stolas started, blinking from the further disorientation of having his avian proboscis smacked by his own gesture, before quickly sobering up and recognizing the small bedroom. And the horns greatly obscuring his vision. “Oh! Good morning, Blitzy…” The royal’s voice was split with adoration and hesitation… awkwardness, even, which soon reflected itself in his un-focusing eyes and jagged movements. Seemingly not sure how to handle Blitzo being so close to him after all that recently happened. His hands no longer resting or holding the imp, as much as uncertainly hovering behind his back like two clueless creatures rather than his own appendages.

  
“Yeah, morning. You’ve been out cold, when was the last time you fucking slept?” Blitzo leaned back with a well-meaning smirk, perking one of his eyebrows high as he eyed the ruffled stick-figure with a slow scan. One that seemed to make Stolas aware of his own appearance and shot a glance to the full-for-imp-body mirror mounted on the wardrobe doors. He closed his eyes at the ghastly sight with an undignified sigh, before turning back to imp that for once made no attempts of escaping his clutches. His words from yesterday rang through-out Stolas’ head as a reminder, making the Prince unable to hold back the soft smile growing forth on his lips. A lovely gesture from the aggressive and possessive little imp.

  
“Days, I suppose. A week or more since I rested this well, despite the lacking length and softness. Having you near me always seems to put me at ease, Blitzy.” Stolas’ smile turned sombre, yet honest with admiration, as he leaned his head against the horns of the imp in his lap. Blitzo, in turn, found his words failing him. Settling for a somewhat tsundere ‘tch…’ whilst also not resisting or refusing the lanky bird his cuddles. “Thank you… We have a lot to talk about, but I think it might be for the best if much of it was shared with our daughters present. I would rather not keep Octavia out of this, and I know how much you treasure your little Loona.”

  
“If he did, he’d make breakfast already! Fucking starving over here…” Loona’s voice rang with the slightest of muffle through the thin and abused bedroom door, causing Stolas to perk up slightly in surprise. A faint hint of embarrassment on his face as he realized how much could be heard through-out the apartment, compared to the lengthy corridors of his former home. Blitzo began chuckling, raising a finger up to Stolas’ beak in a hushing motion as he himself grinned with a sinister undertone. He then pointed the same finger down, gesturing towards his own pants? No… Stolas realized with a wide-eyed and slight purple glow beneath his facial feathers that he was, indeed, in the nude… wide-legged, due to the small bed… and the door’s location compared to the end of the bed… and who had recently slammed it shut, and… Raising a hand, he covered his central eyes whilst squinting the upper ones tightly shut. Blitzo just laughed as he jumped off the bed and began digging for any spare clothes that might fit the bird.

“… Soooo, should I inspect Lucifer to come knocking asking for you two, or…?” Blitzo turned from the stove to shoot a glance between father and daughter, who sat around the round kitchen table in joint silence alongside Loona. The latter of whom had her phone out in one hand, cup of coffee in the other. She normally hated coffee unless sweetened to perfection, but Blitzo knew his adopted daughter well enough to say nothing. She was drinking it only to wake up and be more alert around her current company, which was an unspoken act of affection on par with the imp’s own. The two of them understood each other regarding such things. However, the two owl-morphs had been staring holes in the table since seating around it… unwilling or mayhaps unable to speak up, or just not knowing WHERE to start. Prompting the household chef to poke at the topics.

  
“Oh, no I would highly doubt that to be the cause. His highness was briefed on the details when we left the mansi- the, scene… He warped there the moment I called after subduing Stella. She is in his hands for interrogation, and it is more likely that the next steps will be solved via phone.” Stolas nodded with a slight pained expression on his face after having to so briefly summarize the results of the marital argument that shook hell the day prior. Neither him nor his daughter seemed overly keen on sharing what exactly had been said or done to cause it all, but it was also no news that the arranged (more like DERANGED, Blitzo thought to himself) wife of Stolas had spited the idea of the Prince having an affair with an imp. Not that he had an affair, such things were common stance and usually helped either partners satisfy both frustrations and needs without involving their partners, which lead to them being able to co-exist longer. No, the problem had been Blitzo’s stature in society as the second lowest breed. Which had infuriated the noble due to the shame.

  
“… Hey, Blitz?” Octavia spoke up after a few seconds of silence, causing the bacon-frying Imp to turn his head to peek over the other shoulder at her. “Thanks. For letting us crash here, I mean. It was short notice and selfish of me, and I’ll make sure you’re compensated once we get to the cabin.” Octavia sunk her eyes into her cup, choosing to focus on the java within as Blitzo raised an eyebrow. Stolas looked worried and saddened, but also too timid to say anything. Loona peering over the case of her phone, and the imp could notice a twinge of surprise over the owl’s words, but she kept her poker-face by resuming attention to her phone. Blitzo, in turn, caused them all to jump as he abruptly slid the pan across the cast-iron grid of his stove with a metallic screech!

  
“Pardon me, princess… but the fuck are you on about?” Blitzo asked in his usual passive-aggressive manner. Looking to Octavia whilst pointing at her with a grease-dripping spatula. His face calmed, hers surprised. Her father’s shocked. “Don’t get me wrong, I know your dad could stone me in an instant for this, but fucking Christ… You really have no idea how this shit works, do you?” As the imp’s face turned into a serious- even accusive-looking frown, Octavia felt a spark of anger blend in with her confusion.

  
“Wh- What do you mean? Why are you upset with me NOW?! I just offered to compensate you for coming here to -prevent- anyone getting more upset!” Octavia’s raised voice made Stolas look uncomfortable, as he did not know how to handle the situation if it turned into an argument between his recently traumatized daughter and his lover who had invited them into his house. It did not help when Blitzo started snickering with a wry smirk, causing Octavia’s face to widen in surprise and anger, shooting up by slamming her hands on the table. “YOU don’t get to LAUGH at this! If it wasn’t for YOU, none of this would have HAPPENED!”

  
“Well at least you got THAT right.” Blitzo sighed with a nod, his agreement to her unfair and rage-spat accusation taking her aback just long enough for him to continue. “What? You think it wasn’t obvious enough for even an IMP like me to get it?” Blitzo’s smirk and choice of words caused a recoil in Octavia’s frames, making her realize just who she had sounded like. “Trust me, darling… I am well aware of the situation I am in. As well as what I’ve caused. So yeah, of course I get mad! What did you expect me to get?”

  
“Wh-…” Octavia looked stunned. Unable to follow the imp’s logic of apparently admitting guilt and reflecting it back at the same time. “What the hell are you saying…?” Was all she could manage, noticing her father starting to calm down and relax, even growing a soft smile… was he catching on to something she had missed? Even Loona was smiling softly behind her phone! As Blitzo flipped the bacon in the cooling pan once more, he walked over to the table and leaned on it with a calm grin. Looking Octavia straight in her eyes.

  
“Princess… I’m fucking your dad, alright?” The start to his sentence taking both the owls by visual surprise. “Marriage is a tradition Lucifer brought with him when he fell, alright? It is why the Nobles still insists on it, and everyone who wants to mimic their fancy ways does the same. Very few imps actually ever fall in ‘love’. With us, it is rare enough to fuck the same hole twice. Most imp families are forged just by two adults either being too weak, ugly, crazy or horny to lay around and start relying on each other.” Blitzo sighed as he turned to Stolas briefly with an annoyed yet soft look on his face. “I suck at explaining myself, Princess. I act rather than speak. I used to fuck around like any other imp until I met Prince Pipe-cleaner over there. If I fucked him JUST for the book, do you think I’d have stopped fucking others?”

There was a moment of awkward and very blushed silence around the table. Octavia, for all her time online and the associated she had there, had never been exposed to an unfiltered imp quite that way… the crass choices of words and the ‘what’s the weather’ attitude when speaking of having intercourse with her father was… refreshingly simple to understand, but also distracting and embarrassing at the same time. Even her father- puffed up with shyness and admiration for the rude little red-skin, seemed to still be adapting to the difference in cultural slang and attitude despite how often and intimate the two seemed to meet. However… she didn’t quite understand the summary that Blitzo was trying to make, either. Stolas seemed to have understood it, but he also knew the imp better in how he explained things via metaphors and-

  
“Hey Blitz… last night, I heard your gun go off twice, but there was only one crash. What’s up with that?” Loona interrupted the silence with a knowing smirk, causing Octavia to look at her in confusion and Stolas to do the same in questioning. Blitzo suddenly looking a little darker red across the cheeks and shooting his daughter a sharp glare. “Yeah, don’t you remember? You grabbed your gun, went outside, then there was a shot but nothing came of it… the second one did, but why did the first shot do nothing? Why would your GUN be loaded with a DUD when you keep it in the-“

  
“OKAY, Loona! I GET IT!” Blitzo interrupted with a frustrated groan and went back to the stove to quickly toast some bread for the bacon. All three looking at him with expecting eyes, and he was well aware of it. Just hating the spot Loona had put him in. Even if he understood why she had done it, as he too could see the confusion on Octavia’s face.

  
“Blitzy…” Stolas carefully inserted himself back into the conversation. “I too want to know… you gave me the lord of all frights with that stunt you pulled. You never go anywhere without that thing with you, and why would you have it loaded with a blank? What if it had been a real bullet…?” Stolas’ voice began shaking slightly at the end, fear over the results that could have been at the mix-up between blank round and proper bullet sinking into him. Blitzo, in turn, sighing. His shoulders slumping as he took a second to prepare himself.

  
“… When at work or on duty, yeah, she’s always loaded. Even when walking between home and work I keep her ready.” He flipped the bread slices to prevent them burning, giving himself another brief pause to choose his words. “I’ve never kept her loaded at home, or at your place, Stolas. I use blanks for intimidation purposes and distractions, SHOULD something happen. But no, never real bullets near…” Blitzo trailed off, memories starting to flash by his eyes as his head sunk.

  
“… near, what…? Blitz?” Octavia filled the air. Feeling her father wanting to ask, but knowing their relation of love-hate might trigger the imp. The same way her father knew it might if it came from him. Besides, she was grossly curiously herself as to why the imp would avoid such a thing.

  
“… fucking hell…!” Blitzo gritted his teeth and gripped the grid of his stove with both hands. The gas-fuelled flames and the heat of the iron having no effects on him, other than offer him support as his head slumped forward in defeat. “… Because I don’t bring loaded weapons near family, alright…?”

  
Octavia’s eyes slowly widened at the confession, as the earlier puzzle pieces started falling into place. By explaining how marriage between imps was rare, with the cultural representation of it being a reliant or trusting fuck-buddy, had he impied he saw her dad as his… them as a…? He was powerless, just an imp… but would choose to go unarmed not only around a Prince of hell that could destroy him instantly if wronged, but also within the mansion of his hateful wife that DID wish for his destruction…? Just because he saw Stolas as family…? Then… her, by extension… did he…? Octavia’s attention was drawn to the increasing surge of nearby magic, as he laid eyes on her father. Her heart sank at the sight, as Stolas was looking wide-eyed at Blitzo with tears rapidly flowing from each of four eyes. Clearly, her father had some insight into the mental picture Blitzo had of them… but to hear the extents of which he put his own safety at risk, without anyone knowing it, just to uphold a moral code and unshown affection?

  
“… so yeah… of course I get fucking mad when you not only speak of ditching already for some fuck-off unknown cabin, but also that you think I’d expect payment for housing you two. I wouldn’t dedicate my dick to your dad if I hadn’t accepted the baggage that’d come with him… I’m not stupid in THAT way…” Blitzo sighed again and turned to Octavia with an exhausted smile that still brimmed with honesty and sincerity in a way she never expected possible for the imp. “Nor am I stupid enough to miss how it brightens my Loonie whenever you two chat, or how she’ll leap for the phone when you text her.” His smile turned into more of a smirk, making him instantly more recognizable before he vanished into the feathers of Stolas. The prince bawling his eyes out, clutching Blitzo tightly to his awkwardly dressed self of boxers and a shirt-turned-crop-top. Octavia looking deeply embarrassed and turned to Loona, who was locked between wanting to snarl at her father and vanish behind her phone to hide her own face…

“… You truly never seize to amaze me, Blitzy.” Stolas said softly after the door to the apartment closed, their daughters having left to do spend some time together. Blitzo, doing the dishes in uncharacteristic silence, peered at Stolas through the corner of his eyes. Not answering, but perking an inquisitive eyebrow. “That speech you gave Octavia? I honestly doubt anyone has spoken to her in quite that manner, for one, but to think you could weave such beauty and affection into it all…” The prince smiled with admiration to the imp, who shot a sharp hiss through his teeth and returned his attention to the dishes. His ego still somewhat bruised from Loona essentially forcing him to use his words and bare his squishy, mushy side.

  
“… still gonna cut Loona’s weed in half for a month after that… traitorous mutt…” He mumbled, barely managing to conceal his smile by pretending to have the hooked towel stuck on its bronze pin. “It did get me thinking. Are you actually alright staying here? Imp ceilings make you walk as straight as your sexuality, Stolas.” Blitzo turned, carefully drying a mug gifted to him by Loona years ago. Whatever she had written on it at the time had long since been worn out, but Blitzo would regularly re-write or re-draw images of his choice on the worn, white porcelain.

  
“Hmm, I did spend a brief moment to ponder that myself earlier. You would not happen to be well acquainted with the neighbour above you, by any chance?” Stolas perked his gaze up with a blank face, making Blitzo squint his eyes in suspicion. Stolas pulling out his poker-face around him was rare, and almost always hinted to shenanigans…

  
“Not really. Some old crone that usually bangs the floors whenever she thinks Loona’s music is too loud. Never tried getting to know me, so I never tried to get to know her.” He shrugged, carefully inserting the mug into the cupboard amongst the other mismatching and horse-themed mugs of his collection. Stolas nodding in reply.

  
“I do have an idea. I shall go have a little chat with her, see if she is willing to cooperate.” Stolas nodded to himself as he casually walked over to the door- well, as casual as one can when bent 90 degrees at the waist to dodge lamps. Blitzo elected to not question it, but did notice Stolas swirling his fingers and summoning his wallet. All he did was listen carefully over the next few minutes of cleaning the last from breakfast, hearing less of Stolas’ calm and melodic voice but plenty of the shrill neighbour’s. Eventually, it came to a sudden halt and-… No door being slammed? He thought he heard the heavy door close, but it was done so carefully. Shortly after, Stolas returned with a bristled puff of chest-feathers and darkened eyes.

  
“… I take it she was as charming as ever…?” Blitzo asked with a smirk, before his face dropped when Stolas began scratching glowing marks into his ceiling. “Hey! Don’t take it out on MY home! The fuck, Stolas?!” Blitzo scurried over, but was quickly shut down by Stolas raising a hushing finger almost directly in his face. The imp realizing that the crouching bird-demon did so with the same hand that he scratched the markings with, the other being tightly clenched around something…

  
“JUST, a moment…” Stolas uttered through a rapidly clicking beak, which Blitzo had learned to be the bird-equivalent of loudly snarling. He narrowed his eyes and folded his arms, yet let the prince do his thing… for now, he thought. However, it did not take more than a few seconds for the arcane artisan to finish his drafting of runes and patterns. Upon making several circles within each other of smaller and smaller size, he pinched the smallest one between two fingers and woke the spell to life! The elaborate yet tiny symbols lighting up as if solid objects, before Stolas pulled the smallest circle downwards. Causing the larger ones to follow in line, until they formed several levels in the shape of a sharp cone from the roof. Stolas spread his hand beneath it and uttered with annoyed- yet clear voice a word of power that sounded like gibberish to Blitzo, before rapidly pushing the layers of rings upwards! Making them and his hand impact with the roof, which buzzed with same-coloured energies and… kept rising?! Blitzo’s eyes grew wide as he observed Stolas slowly straighten himself up to fully standing position, seemingly lifting the ceiling of the entire apartment one-handed with great ease. The wallpapers and doorframes seemingly elongating along the rising roof, to the point that Blitzo heard the furniture and items of the apartment above being crushed and compressed between the rising floor and unmoving final layer of the complex…

  
“There we are! Much better, wouldn’t you agree, dear?” Stolas put his hands on his hips as he looked around, seemingly very satisfied with his handiwork and ability to stand straight once more. “Your neighbour was QUITE the unneighbourly character! Poh! I was willing to purchase her apartment from her at a price I now regret being so generous with, but she would not even hear me out before she started to accuse me of various nonsense! Eventually I grew too tired of it all together. Upon some, words are simply wasted.” He shook his head with a roll of his eyes, before shooting a smile down to Blitzo who was taking in the new hotel-lobby-height of his apartment.

  
“… Did you crush her along with that fucking radio of hers?” He eventually asked, with a lack of remorse or regret for his neighbour, but more out of sheer curiosity. Stolas, in turn, chuckled and shook his head.

  
“Oh, no no no. Nothing so grisly. Admittedly, I considered a few ways to just silence her then and there, but I then remembered something important. My diet! It is hard enough to import clean and fresh mice from reliable sources, and I do so seldom get the chance to hunt for myself anymore. However… Problem A sometimes solves problem B.” He chuckled, uncurling his lengthy fingers to reveal a pristine-looking white mouse with a very familiar temper issue. Holding the had-been-neighbour by the tail as she flailed and snarled.

  
“Oh, right, the rat thing. Keep forgetting that part.” Blitzo raised an interested eyebrow as he leaned in closer to grin at the rodent. Giving it a poke that caused it to swing a little. “Serves you right, bitch. Seems you finally bit off more than you could chew, crazy old crone.” He flicked the mouse a middle finger with a cackle and leaned back up, attempting to get used to his new and luxurious space. Already getting ideas regarding decorations.

  
“Speaking of… As much as I do enjoy it when you cook for me, I simply cannot forgo my diet too often, lest I lose my figure. And we would not wish for that, now would we?” Stolas chuckled and raised the rodent upwards as he leaned his head back, his demonic blend between beak and mouth slowly splitting open already in anticipation. Blitzo, seeing it all play out from beneath, was not unfamiliar with the scene about to play out. He had honestly seen far worse in his days, and it was not uncommon for larger Demons and Sinners to consume the weaker or smaller ones… either whole or in pieces. However, and fuck you if you asked him to explain it- IF he had not killed you already for finding out at all… but there was something mortifyingly attention-grabbing about seeing Stolas indulge himself.

Mayhaps it was the complete lack of sadism and cruelty with which he did it, as it betrayed just how powerful the avian was… no gloating, no monologing, no teasing, no disses and no threats. The sheer fact that his prey withheld all its memories and awareness- being by all definitions still as much a person in their cursed form as before? Unaddressed. He knew, that’s for damned certain, but he did not CARE. His kindness and sophistication would lower him to treat lesser ranked hell-dwellers as fellow individuals, but for those he deemed unworthy of his affection and tolerance… he quickly returned to their natural rank in the literal food chain. He would acknowledge their existence, sure, but the memories and experiences behind said existence simply mattered too little for him to care. Too little for him to justify himself to them, to taunt or tease them or in any way feel the need to elevate himself above them. He was already at the top, after all… and knew it by instinct at that point, rather than self-delusion or statistics.

  
Blitzo shivered. Being less than half of Stolas’ length put him at an awkward perspective of the predation. Unable to see more than the mouse frantically squirming and thrashing for that brief second of Stolas angling it, letting out a sharp but quickly silenced squeak of protest and panic as the grip of its tail loosened. Beak clamping down around it unceremoniously, giving Blitzo’s nether region a muscle twitch from memories of said sharp beak’s similar snap against his softer tissues. He did not display his flinching, however. His luminescent yellow eyes firmly mounted on the tip of the tail and how quickly it got pulled in by surprisingly powerful cheeks creating suction. The prince did not even savour experience beyond a satisfied hum over the flavour and liveliness of his game, the hand that had previously held and dropped the doomed imp briefly resting on his cheek with lithely sprawled fingers. Eyes shut into inverted sloped out of enjoyment, certainly, but only for the briefest of seconds before his head shifted.

  
With the length of his neck and general posture, many would be surprised over how flexible the stiff little stick connecting his head to his shoulders were. Almost curling forward, sending Stolas’ head down and forward before elevating it upwards in a rising circle-motion, a dainty little sound of swallowing seeped through the near-invisible nostrils on his beak. Swiftly and without second thought or mercy, a lump travelled down the front of Stolas’ throat. At the height of its curved shape almost doubling the width of the royal’s scarecrow neck. The sheer length between jaw and shoulders made for the illusion that the mouse had been swallowed with savouring slowness, when in actuality Stolas was already getting down from his hunter’s high. Sighing faintly as the bulge seemingly merged with his key bones and ribcage, only to re-appear a moment later as a barely visible jut of his comically slender stomach.

“Aah, much better! It is quite refreshing to break the norm of preserved imports… I should consider indulging myself on a more regular basis.” Stolas chuckled, placing his hands on his hips as his mind was already in its natural process of forgetting not just the old imp and her fate, but also his meal as a whole in favour of moving on with the day. Spending no more time considering or pondering her than Blitzo would over re-visiting an old sandwich topping. A quick note of desired repetition, no more and no less. The mouse now tightly clenched and curled up by his tight core to await a slow fate of suffocation or digestion- Blitzo honestly did not know which would come first to a stubborn rodent, might as well never have been an individual like himself. A life, profession, opinions, family… He knew it was hypocritical of him. What with him being a glorified murderer with a tax bracket, but somehow Stolas brought these thoughts to him. And he did not dislike them. Imps had a respect for power and stature, even if they would mostly be either too young and angsty or too old and bitter to properly show it… But Blitzo firmly liked this part of Stolas. The betrayal of the power behind the doting father and giggling bottom… the bestial nature covered by a plaster of sophistication…

  
“I’ll make you a list of the, like, two neighbours that owe me favours.” The imp smirked, stepping up onto his sofa and further from there onto the armrest as Stolas perked a perplexed eyebrow. “What? Most shitheads out there are fair game. Eat what you need. I’ve seen you sick, and I’d rather NOT have to stay home and care for a spoiled royal with a man-cold just because of fucking diet differences.” Blitzo gave Stolas’ barely noticeably swollen gut an accusive poke with the tip of his middle finger, throwing the prince an annoyed glare at the thought of Stolas’ sickness drama on his own couch. The towering bird cooed with a soft smile.

  
“Why, Blitzy… I would not have expected you to be this forward thinking. It is a delightful new side of yours. Are you always this caring and considering within the confines of your own home?” Stolas bent forward slightly, arching his upper back and neck to inch closer to the imp with a warm glance of adoration on his mask-like white face. Blitzo clicked with his tongue and did not meet the eyes of the royal, instead slowly pushing the hand he had poked at him with gently against the lanky core of feathers. His fingers gently spreading out to coat and comb Stolas’ belly, causing the flirtatious lord to pause in surprise over the tender intimacy.

  
“Bitch, please… I am the man of my home. My job to make sure it- and those within stay healthy. Failing that; happy. If you become both by eating rats, then fucking go for it.” He spoke lowly and with honest dignity. No up-staging extravagance or bolstering bravado, but merely the honest worries and woes of a family man. A bitter and sinister little family man, but a family man nonetheless. Stolas, in turn, felt another wave of emotion batter the backside of his eyes, threatening to seep through and liquify into tears once more. Mayhaps to save his own dignity, or for having already cried more the past 24 hours than in centuries, he closed his eyes above a warm smile of fondness and leaned his forehead down against the large horns of the lesser demon. Finding the tender and shifting- almost fondling grasp around his core and prey a new and soothing sensation ontop of the surprisingly caring words of his lover.

  
“Mmm… I am really taking a liking to this household-side of yours… A strong, caring father-figure with the intent to drag home and cook the literal bacon for his den and kin. It is equally comforting as it is alluring, my little cave-imp~” Stolas offered a loving smirk, giving the lengthy curls of cursed ivory a suggestive stroke with gently grasping fingers. Blitzo face darkened between his eyes and mouth, as both embarrassment over his own words- flustered insecurities over Stolas’ flirtation- frustration over the perversion of his true feelings and that the fucking bird’s fucking perversion of it totally did it for him!!! He snarled and grabbed Stolas firmly across the throat and neck- not choking him, but with a tight grip that would not easily slip or be removed, before pulling him down onto the couch and unleashed his frustrated, flustered ranting.

“BITCH you better BELIEVE IT! In THIS apartment I am KING! You’re a Prince in your palace, but in this household I. AM. KING! If I don’t see you eating like a functional fucking adult, I will PERSONALLY go out on the streets and BAG you an imp I deem worthy and start shoving them down your gullet until you are FORCED to turn them into rats to not fucking CHOKE! If I have to fucking BIND you down to DO it then by all that is unholy I fucking WILL! I’ll caveman your ass into obedience any day until your slender ass can take care of itself! FUCK IT! I’ll stuff you so hard you’ll have to WIDEN my door just like you en-tall-ered it!! You got that, you lanky-ass snob?! Eat a fucking sandwich instead of COCK for a change, you stick-starved stick-figure!!!”

  
“OH BLITZY!!~” Stolas could but blush deeply enough for it to be visible as a pink glow upon his delicate facial feathers of white, his mouth distorted into a wriggled line of baffled arousal as he was wrestled down amongst pillows and cushions. His arms raised above him, shivering with twitching fingers the same way his legs shot out over the armrest and spasmed there in uncontrolled desire. However long it had been since last he had managed to lure out Blitzo’s aggressive (but harmless) side like this? The assertion, the threats, the attitude, the no-holds-bar and complete lack of fear for man-handling one of the highest ranked Demons in all of the afterlife… by the ancient forces, he truly was a slave to those indulgences. He craved for nothing more than to be ravished by the imp then and there- branded by ruffled feathers and a joint scent of sex, the twitching of exhausted muscles and that immeasurable sensation of a body both so light and weightless- but also so stiff and sore the day after… to be taken and claimed on a sofa in an apartment by the man he loved so dearly, whom he knew loved him back and showed it in his own strange ways-

  
“”WHAT THE FUCK, DAD?!”” The joint voices- one flustered and embarrassed, the other frustrated and annoyed, froze the two males. Neither of them remembering WHEN they had started kissing, nor when their daughters had entered through the heightened door just shortly behind the living room sofa. Blitzo glared towards the clock on the wall, having to re-adjust his glance to compensate for the new altitude of the device. It had barely been an hour. Loona would never go shopping for less than three. He sunk his eyes to scan the immediate surroundings, lips still locked with Stolas’ beak- who for that matter laid perfectly frozen with wide eyes. Blitzo quickly located the familiar wallet in black leather and wolf-motive carved into it poking out from a pause-spread magazine on the low table between couch and TV, grabbing it before releasing Stolas and rising up.

  
“This is why I keep telling you to not just leave it where-ever, Loona.” He smirked with a perfected poker-face, tossing the card-keeper to his daughter who snatched it out of the air with a snarl and wide-eyed glare of disgust. Flipping her adoptive father both middle fingers before leading a beanie-draped Octavia back into the stairway with a slam of the door. Causing Blitzo to sigh and lean back against the arm rest, using the legs of Stolas as actual arm rests as he laid between them. “Better get your phone ready, Stolas. I can smell Voxtagram typing already.” He rubbed the bridge between his eyes with a slight smirk. “… will you do groceries with me? I don’t know Octavia’s tastes and needs, but if we don’t spoil them for dinner I dread the days to come.”

  
Stolas found himself dumbfounded yet again. Simply staring at the imp in awe and fascination over his level-headed cool and calculative adaptability in the face of lesser catastrophes. He knew very well that there were immense differences in culture between the two of them, but it impressed him none the lesser how Blitzo could so quickly adapt and dominate a social situation like so. Stolas could think of no-one from his web of royal connections and professionals that would not succumb to shock and embarrassment- freezing up at a complete lack of know-how and priority in the face of such a disgraceful position… but not the imp currently straightening his shirt between the lanky legs of the pondering poultry, giving him an inquisitive peek beneath a perked eyebrow. Upon the imp asking him “What…?” with all the authority that came with seeing the recent events as standard and non-threatening, Stolas could but shiver into a sobered smile and stroke the pigment-damaged cheek of his lover. Admiration in his voice as he uttered three seldom spoken words…


	3. Promise you won't leave?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Life for the joint families is slowly approaching something of a stabilized concept. Of course, two pent-up padres stuck in a flat together with their daughters hitting the mall, all whilst Stolas is still waiting for his special bird-cleaning product... well, the air is getting a bit dense. As is the judgement of a very prideful Imp.  
> Things get freaky in this chapter. Warnings were issued...

I.M.P; Intimately Messy Parentalhood ch 3. Promise you won’t leave?

“… So… I spoke in lengths with Octavia today, whilst you and Loona were at work.” Stolas suddenly broke the silence that had filled the warped apartment, looking over to Blitzo as he garnished the dinner roast with a blend of finely chopped herbs. More than a pinch of which had been trimmed from his daughter’s balcony-mounted glasshouse of marijuana, but Stolas had stopped question it at that point. Ever since his meetings with the imp became regular he had been introduced to ‘pot’ and found it far more relaxing and recoverable than alcohol, even if he still preferred a fine wine for its taste and elegance. Blitzo’s ‘Relaxo Roast’ would certainly not get anyone high, but it would offer a soothing lull on top of a belly full of meat. A perfect Friday dinner to ease into the weekend, Stolas had to admit. Especially since he provided the wine!

  
“Oh yeah? Dare I assume it was related to inheriting your taste in partners?” Blitzo’s smirk, sardonic as it was, went unseen by the gangly owl-morph due to the angle of his view. Seeing little of the imp but the spiked back of his head and his lengthy horns. It took a couple of seconds before the apron-clad assassin turned around to investigate the silence, rolling his eyes as he spotted the clueless confusion on his partner’s face. “Same-sex and low-ranked. It was a joke, Stolas.” He smiled a bit more honestly, if still with his typical dash of sly cockiness. Which, in combination with the jab at the similarities in apparent preference and the crass self-awareness of it, made Stolas a bit flustered and laughed awkwardly.

  
“A-heh… well, yes. Certainly one way to summarize it…” His gaze fell into the comically small mug of tea in his hands as Blitzo’s returned to the roast. “I have nothing against your daughter, I hope you are aware. If anything, I find her quite charming! You two are very similar, so how could I not? And it is clear that she cares for- and supports Octavia in ways I, as a parent, can or may not… something I suppose I must simply accept as part of life.” As he sighed, Blitzo grunted in sympathy.

  
“Well… you wouldn’t let your dresser make your meals and your cook pick your outfits, now would you? Want someone dead; hire an assassin. Want someone raised; call a parent. Want someone to be friends with…” Blitzo let his words hover as he paused his work briefly, unable to see the slight amazement on Stolas’ face behind him. What the imp had said was certainly not profound or breaking any new ground in parenting, but it never seized to amaze the Prince just how naturally analogies came to Blitzo. Quick wits and a sharp tongue certainly did not result in a word-smith, especially not with his cultural preference for insults and crude phrasings, but by Jove it made him a refreshing conversation partner in all topics.

  
“… you are wise beyond your years, Blitzy. And I do not say such things commonly.” Stolas hooted a chuckle with a gaze of admiration towards the imp, who had spun around- roast platter in hand and opened the oven with a coil of his tail. “You are correct though, and it may very well be as simple as you compose it. I personally had no friends the same way Octavia does in Loona, and I am thankful that she was spared the cold stiffness common in my youth… even if her mother and our relatives refused to move on from such traditions. But alas, I am getting off topic!” He coughed without the real need to, if only to reset the conversation. “I took the time earlier today to inquire about their relationship. It took a while to break through barriers of concerns that I would be of the same mindset as Stella and therefor be against it for social and fertile reasons, but we ended up having a long and heartfelt discussion together. It was… very uplifting. I cannot recall when last we spoke so intimately and trustingly amongst each other, she and I.”

  
“Sappy old bird…” Blitzo smirked as he took a seat opposite Stolas, a cup of java in his own hands. “Still glad to hear it. Gotta be honest, after the other night I started to doubt she’d ever look you in the eyes again. So… what did she say? Do I need the Safe Word to have you drop the suspension?” He grinned before taking a sip of bean-juice, though instantly regretting making a lewd joke in the vicinity of Stolas.

“Mmm… I will let that word-play slide for now, my little mustang…” Stolas erupted a coo of tickled amusement from the depths of his slightly puffed chest, though the feathers smoothened back down slowly as he continued talking. “What she did tell me is that they are, for the time being, very close friends. Both of them, according to Octavia at least, seem to be aware that there is some tension of attraction between them. They have, however, mutually agreed to keep things friendly and explore with great caution. Whilst in the long run it would matter for naught, Loona still has a few years ahead of Octavia into adulthood. If anything, it seems your daughter has been the one advocating for careful proceeding the most. The way Octavia speaks of her, one could think your fierce little canine an angelic authority of patience and maternity.”

  
“Bitch, you hinting to that she isn’t? My little Loona is a saint.” Blitzo smiled with a proud puff of filled lungs, his face and voice completely void of any sarcasm or comedy. Revealing just how highly he thought of his daughter, or mayhaps how well he knew her behind the facades? Or maybe it simply spoke more of his own impish morals… “She actually came to me a few weeks back with a sudden interests in the age difference between you and I. Wondering if I was fine fucking someone old enough to forget if he is a three or four digits.” He snickered as Stolas’ white face turned into an undignified pink at the assumption of his age.

  
“I will have you know that I am perfectly aware of my age, thank you very much. I am merely four-hundred and twenty, so you may let her know that it is still QUITE a while before I turn ‘four digits’. Besides, on the topic of having any concerns about age and the forgetfulness of it, have I not seen you celebrate the same birthday over and over again? Twenty-three, my quill…” Stolas puffed. Alas, there was no shortage of fondness to his smile. He had tried to figure out Blitzo’s exact age multiple times, but it had proven a mystery even to someone of his calibre and resources! Oh, he could always utilize magical means to hypnotize the imp into honesty- or analyse his skeleton to calculate the age through peeling through the cycles of calcium replacement! Certainly. But that would be in poor sport. Far from all imps were registered upon birth due to the chaotic and unpredictable society that surrounded them, with Blitzo being an even harder target as he was born into a Circus… All Stolas had managed to dig up where the same old posters that Blitzo himself had decorated his company spaces with. All he had learned from those was that the imp had been well into adulthood AND employed still during the same times that Stolas himself would bring Octavia to such parks and shows! Which was well over 13 years ago… oh how it had frustrated him realizing they had walked by each other so closely so long ago, how much earlier they could have met…

  
“Hey, I know my age. I just don’t share it.” Blitzo smirked, though there was a faint delay before the mask of believability caught up with the expression, Stolas noticed. “The younger that people think you are, the less of a fuck-up they think you are when shit goes south. Age is connected to success, you know? As long as I feel young, I’ll keep the charade up.” He leaned back with a faint and self-pleased smile on his face, taking a deep sip of his steaming coffee. Which may be to blame for the picture Stolas thought himself witness, what with the distortion of the air from heat and moisture, but in that light and without his usual make-up… Blitzo looked so very, very tired and worn. His usual mascara and paints were discrete and thematic, bringing attention to his sharp and clever eyes whilst blending in with the discrete over-all concept of Clowns and Jesters. Despite the thinness of said black lines, it was clear that Blitzo could only live in momentary bliss of self-delusion by practicing extreme self-awareness, as said lines must be just thick enough to cover- or at lease hide the darkened depths beneath his peepers.

  
Stolas split his beak open ever so slightly, but slowly let it come back to a close. Finding himself at a loss for words. Once more it dawned on him that Blitzo’s spontaneous bursts of wisdom and insight all stemmed from what was called “Street Smarts”. Not from decades of studies and discussions with the educated elite that could result in a philosophical mind and strategic awareness, the way he and his kind achieved it. No, it came from a cruel and brutal crash-course in survival. Blitzo struggled in keeping his attention on any literature without pictures or equine factoids, let alone any psychological evaluations with complex references to modern medicine and the lengthy-worded lexicons that came with them. What would take years of reading, discussions and references to transmute Knowledge into Wisdom- the kind that came natural and instinctual, had been beaten into the imp in fractions of such times. Assault, loss, trauma, mockery, injury, heartbreak… Even ignorant and childish people turn wise from hardship unless they are fools. And whilst Blitzo certainly was foolish, he was not a fool. For he clearly carried with him all the wisdoms of his past. Every time that side of the imp resurfaced, it brought complex feelings to Stolas. Pride and admiration for the cunning and witty brilliance that his lover displayed when the situation called for it, as well as deep regret and guilt over imagining what Blitzo had to endure or sacrifice for it. The hardships of imps were plentiful, he knew that, and it constantly put his own struggles into perspective…

With the discussion of age neatly folding itself on the mutual respect to not push further, the two had eventually returned to the topic of their daughters. Both were in agreement to offer support to the current approach between the two girls, both fathers being proud that their prides had not rushed head-first into foolishness over caution and respect. Should they find a worthwhile desire and attraction to one and other, then they would carefully deal with that situation as it came. If not, then they would at least still have the good and relatable friends in each other that the both had so solemnly lacked. They were lonely natures, and it greatly pleased their caretakers to simply observe them with smiles and snickers on their lips when in each other’s company. Seeing one’s child display happiness was a boon. One neither intended to squander, especially since the young adults in question were already showing such mature awareness and caution!

  
The dinner that night was one of great enjoyment. Loona and Octavia held near dominion over the air as they kept mostly talking to one and other, with occasional re-direction to either or both fathers with questions or invitations when touching upon plans, memories and foggy details. At times, Stolas or Blitzo respectively would- between their silence and charmed smiles as they observed the two young women happily converse, slide in a question or two. Maybe even threaten a tease by hinting to a past event of embarrassment, as obligation permitted them. In the end, all four sat in their chairs with faint but pleasant swells to their demonic slim cores. The dense roast itself doing one banger of a job in establishing a drowsy satisfaction, aided by the homegrown and unorthodox seasonal blend. It was not enough to drive anyone into a height, but the relaxation was driven home all the better with it.

  
The remains of the Friday evening got spent all across the apartment. Loona and Octavia having agreed to do the dishes in exchange for some extra coin and hours to spend the next day after expressing plans and desire to visit the mall. Octavia all but lacking her own wardrobe since the incident at the mansion, and despite the frequent texts and messages between the two, she and Loona had not possessed more than the occasional hour here and there to hang. What with Loona being employed as a secretary at I.M.P and both their parents agreeing on strict curfew. So the deal was struck that the girls would have their trip during Saturday with the fathers left at home, then the opposite during Sunday as to get Stolas out of second-hand imp clothes.

  
As the girls tended to the cooking wares and china, Blitzo excused himself for a brief smoking break and stepped outside for a few minutes. No-one questioned it as he did, even if Loona gave him a brief and questioning glance. He had met it out of suspicion that she would, answering by throwing a tired and confirming wink. To which she lowered her gaze and returned her attention to the pan and Octavia’s little monolog on constellations.

Once outside, Blitzo quickly loaded his pistol and stepped into the alleyway leading in behind his apartment complex and between the others near it. He did not smoke on the regular, at least not like one with an addiction or reliability on cigarettes would, but he would at times indulge when the moment demanded it. Like when his hands were shaking with emotion and his eyes straining against the pressure from behind. When the relaxation and drowsiness from the meal almost stole his guard from him in front of those he cared for. When memories flooded his thoughts with vivid images of what was and never would be. Haunting lines of doubt and questions of indignation, of sardonic doubt and judgement of his worthiness.

  
Sinking to the worn concrete floor, hidden from view by the peculiar and uneven architecture, he snarled between his teeth. His hands too shaky for the cigarette to ignite from the small flame conjured from his thumb’s tip. In frustration, knowing he only had so much time and would need the scent of smoke to sell both his break and irritated eyes to Stolas and Octavia, he let his entire hand erupt in wild flames. The heat and gluttony of the fire did not harm him, even if it seared off a good third of the tobacco-stick in an near instant. He drew a deep and jagged breath to fill his lungs with the soothing and gaseous drug, before letting out a relieved and elongated sigh of pitch-black smoke. One could make out faint lines of red and purple where-ever the cloud jutted out and contrasted against itself, trace elements of the magic involved in giving mortal-concept drugs an actual effect on demonic bodies.

  
He spent the next few minutes focusing on those lines. Forcing himself into a daze by imagining shapes and figures from the pulsating arcana amongst the shifting darkness. Blocking out the memories and his own self-doubt. The hopes of a child born from the rare occasions where his father managed to combine Soberness, Happiness AND Attentiveness during dinners, along with a mother who actually bothered making said food instead of whoring herself out to the circus director for outfits and benefits. The lofty dreams and naïve hopes he, as a young boy at the time, held in him for such near-functional and kind-off pleasant dinners to become a norm. That, since it WAS possible to witness ever so rarely, that the empty and hungry and painful evenings might come to an end soon. That he was not doomed to spent his youth under his father’s disapproving gaze and mother’s dismissal over his sisters. That he was not destined to be a hidden-away failure that had to be taken in and treated by his sisters every time anything went wrong, and HE was given the blame for it all with the very literal short end of the broomstick.

  
As the dead-of-thought motion suddenly offered no physical feedback, Blitzo sobered up from his attempted avoidance of memory lane. There was no cigarette left between his fingers for him to draw upon anymore. The final butt having disintegrated into ash and fallen apart after his last intake, his natural immunity to fire and heat having not alerted him to the final cinders even as he held them. He sighed and pushing himself up. Hands still shaking, but only barely and he would soon be back to normal. He had sent the elevator back up to the top floor after getting out of it, so it would buy him an extra few breaths without suspicion as he would have to call it back down. He knew Loona no longer fell for it, but it had taken her years to figure out and catch him. It was the first and only time she had seen him so desperately broken. He had tried to play it off, but she had just told him to take his time and gone back up to the apartment. There was mutual respect between them regarding giving the other space, which got deepened after that encounter. He knew therefor that she would not give him away to the two owl-morphs. She was a good girl like that. Stolas would likely figure it out sooner or later… but that would be Tomorrow Blitzo’s problem!

“… Stolas…”

  
“Yes, Blitzy dear?” The lengthy avian turned with a surprised look at the pained voice.

  
“When will that fucking baby-chalk of yours arrive?” Blitzo gave him a frustrated look, which sent shivers of indignation and shame through the royal’s spine.

  
“Oh… My apologies, I suppose it has been a few days… Well, hopefully by Monday! I believe the issue lies in their refusal to deliver on weekends… hellish service, no pun intended…” His already near-non-existent shoulders slumped like the corners of his smile, a faint blush of embarrassment on his pale face as he returned his gaze to his paperwork at the kitchen table. It pained him greatly to feel so filthy, yet it pained him more to KNOW he was filthy enough to now smell. Even if the singular tub of the apartment was shared between the four now living in it, he could manage. The luxury of a private tub was not something he took for granted. No, the issue lied in his avian exterior. Purging sweat and filth from feathers designed to repel moisture demanded special shampoos, soaps and cleansing powders, of which his supply had been destroyed and forced him to put in an emergency order. Which meant having to endure the indignity of accumulating the stench of a bin-diver in front of his beloved whilst living under his roof… Oooh, Stella would pay for this…

  
“Woah, woah, woah! Easy there! This table is only eight years old!” Blitzo’s annoyed voice snapped Stolas out of his enraged focus, making him realize that he had put enough force on the quill in his hand to cut through the paper with the sharp metal tip! Now carving sophisticated letters into the worn polish of the wood beneath. He blinked and recoiled, shame doubled as he hid his face in his hands and swore a lengthy verse in ancient Greece.

  
“Damnation… I apologize, Blitzy. I suppose I let my emotions get the better of me, again…” The tall owl-morph glared with utter defeat and exhaustion at the papers before him, already twirling his fingers to make repairs to the document and table whilst the damages were fresh. He had elected to go over the bulk of paperwork related to both his divorce, the damage report to his ancestral home as well as the legal trial approaching regarding the fight itself only after settling down. Certainly not wanting to do it in front of Octavia either, for that matter.

  
“Hey, don’t-… don’t worry about it, alright? Take your time. That bitch fucked you over bad, for a long fucking time, but if you loose your cool you’ll make mistakes. Trust me on that. Take a break, calm your tits, strike with collected precision to hurt her back double.” Too short to reach Stolas’ shoulder even when he sat leg-folded on an imp-sized chair, Blitzo settled for an encouraging pat on the bird’s lengthy arm with a sinister smirk of support. Words and gesture that struck Stolas right in his smelly old heart. Predatorily clawed hands upon lengthy prey-reaching arms shot out before enwrapping Blitzo into a tight hug that lifted him off the floor with ease. The imp’s brightly yellow eyes widened as his sharp face was buried into the musky feathers on Stolas’ chest, causing the spikes along his spine and neck to shiver. “E-Easy there, your royal smelliness!” He protested with faked gall, yet not without a smile stiffened for reasons Stolas would misunderstand, quickly letting the imp go with an embarrassed frown.

  
“Do forgive me, I forgot… but I do appreciate your support, Blitzy. I treasure you dearly, my delightful little lover.” Stolas’ words and faint blush of shame for his believed stench caused Blitzo’s insides to register heat, the faint veins of blood to his spines like roots of pulsating coals. He only nodded with his usual grin and pretended to return to his own project of browsing the internet for adjustable furniture, whilst in actuality struggling to calm himself…

“… fucking son of a…” Blitzo whispered between clenched teeth, about to reach his limit. If Stolas had heard him, he did not show it. The two were making lunch together, and the situation had turned into Blitzo’s personal hell. When Stolas heightened the apartment, a lot of the shelves and decors that were mounted against both walls and ceiling tagged along outside of the imp’s reach. One of the reasons he had been looking into getting new furniture, aside from the lengths of the avians staying with him. But until then, it meant that Stolas felt responsible for the inconvenience caused by his frustration and impatience at the time, as he would have considered such things in a calmer state of mind. So every time Blitzo cooked- and he insisted he did! He was not a great cook, but he took pride in being the only one in the household that COULD do it at all! Well, it meant every time he did, Stolas would help him reach what he accidentally elevated.

  
Stolas had not properly bathed in days. Stolas was also more than twice the height of the imp. Stolas was also wearing ill-fitting clothing that barely covered him at all. Stolas was ALSO constantly walking just behind and reaching over the imp that kept finding himself between, beneath or rubbed against his musky fucking cloaca! Stolas was of-fucking-course ALSO clearly pent up to SHIT but had the mental discipline to ignore it… Blitzo did NOT and he HATED it. They normally met at least once per month to vent out the sexual frustrations accumulated, but the lengthy fight and uncertain grounds at Stolas’ mansion had cancelled the last meeting and then some. They were both two months and a few days into involuntary celibacy, after so long of regular relief. Add to that all the additional stress, worries, concerns and anxieties piled on onto the refused unleash, and Blitzo was close to go insane over the smells being literally rubbed against him.

  
He had managed to convince a clearly self-deprecating Stolas that he smelled badly as a ways to justify distance and the tics of facial muscles. In actuality, it was Blitzo coming to terms with the actual scent of his lover. For as dirty as Stolas could be in the bedroom, he was still of regal birth and it showed. He was always freshly bathed and well-perfumed. The most Blitzo ever caught of his actual scent would be in the early hours the day after their sexual frenzies, where traces of last night’s physical strain would linger as left-over scents of sex and sweat. But this…? This was different and new. This was Stolas’ raw smell. He did not reek, even if there was a tinge to his scent. No, it was deep and musky, almost fragrant. Familiar enough for Blitzo’s unconscious to recognize it as Stolas, yet with such a deep dash of sexual frustration that it drove him mad. The scent filled his mind with visual representations of a dripping, slightly swollen and aching cloaca. Of a hot and flustered face with hungry eyes and a craving tongue lolling out of a gaping beak.

  
“… Blitzy, are you feeling unwell?” Stolas cautious voice and careful touch on his shoulder snapped Blitzo out of the trance he did not realize he had succumbed to. The knife in his hand having seared through not just the meat but the cutting board as well from latent pyrokinetic energies, the hilt itself a scorching, dripping mess of smelted plastic in his hand. Whether it be from realizing the jig was up or because he no longer cared enough to try and act above it, the imp let sound a reversed hiss by sharply sucking in air through a gritted snarl. Swiping the char-joint meat, board and knife to the floor with the same motion that cleaned his hand of plastic, he slammed a hand against the free bench space to leap up onto it. From there, grabbing ahold of Stolas’ borrowed shirt and pulling him down to face level, the Owl looking dumbfounded and slightly horrified over the sudden outburst and apparent hatred on the imp’s face.

  
“Spread’em…” Blitzo snarled from a slightly jutted jaw and blazing eyes, tightening his grip on Stolas’ clothing when the bird responded in blushed confusion but neither action nor word. “SPREAD THEM!” Blitzo kicked against the bench with enough force to push the gangly bird-anthro back, holding on and riding his slim torso as the royal’s lengthy legs caught in the table and made him fall backwards onto it. The imp standing on top of him, one foot on his lanky stomach and the other on the wooden furniture. “I’ve had your musky-ass man-gina rubbed against my face for DAYS now!” There was desperation in Blitzo’s voice, as he yanked Stolas up with one hand on the shirt and catching his head with the other. Forcing a deep kiss across and into the beak of the baffled bird, whose face now burned as crimson as his eyes… which had begun to flicker with realization, threatening to burst the dam of self-control over his lusts.

  
“But--- m-… stinky…?” Was all the prince of hell could muster in a paltry last attempt for excuses and reasoning. To which Blitzo responded by snarling and tearing the second-hand shirt to shreds with his claws, pinning Stolas against the table and burrowing his face in the deep bush of aroused and ruffled feathers… taking a deep and loud breath through his reptilian nostrils. Stolas went wide-eyed with the peculiar mixture of shame and extreme arousal particular to the delving into forbidden or shunned practices, intent on protesting when he felt Blitzo’s hands tremble against him… before refitting their grip around his arms with doubled strength. The imp’s eyes opening with reignited and fierce desire, a near-literal burning passion from the swelling energies within the colour of living amber.

  
“MY stinky bird… All of him. Mine.” Blitzo’s words were soft. Demanding and authoritarian, most certainly out of his jurisdiction and actual power… but there was an honesty within them that spell-bound the master of arcane beneath him. As if the completing words of a formula, Stolas felt the effect immediately. They caused his breath to seize with a gasp, yet his heart skipped a beat before taking off like a stallion’s rapid hooves. Heat and bother made itself present and aware in his nether regions, rising in presence as if each heartbeat threw coal meant for thought and logic onto the rising flames of demand and desire! How something could feel so warm, yet so wet… oh, how he did not care either! As long as it got sated! Attended, at long last!

A minute later, the apartment was already a mess. If either were aware of it, they showed no signs of caring or bothering. Shreds of torn clothing was spread in carnal chaos, decorating the trashed interior and titled furniture in the primal desire to display and brandish home and hearth with lust and passion. Every item, wall, surface… deep-rooted instincts blended with the intelligence to savour perverse pleasure demanded them to rub their scents over it all. Like impulse-driven and unthinking beasts marking their territory and finding a confidence-pleasing reward beyond their understanding from doing so.

  
Charred footprints decorated the walls, benches and higher furniture from where Blitzo would kick off after being folded between them and his lengthy lover, upon whom he kept himself elevated. Deep gashes were left cutting through wallpaper and the flame-retardant materials beneath from Stolas’ spider-like hands and talon-clad fingers, as whenever Blitzo’s powerful kicks sent him back-first into a momentary pin of momentum he had to catch himself with the one hand freed from stroking and squeezing the imp. He would then coo from deep within his throat and push forward, resetting and restarting the frenzied reverse tug-of-war!

  
Eventually, panting and already sweating from the physical contest and wild re-familiarizing of the other’s mouth and back, the two found themselves on their shared bed. Stolas had fallen backwards onto it as his legs hooked against the foot end in a stumble, as he had been aimed with a powerful push against the door but unthinkingly slammed a hand of hastily woven arcane energies against it instead of colliding with it. The sparking, fritzing remains of the unstable defragmentation of wood still floated around them, providing the solitary source of light in the unlit room of drawn window covers. As if someone had let loose a blunderbuss of super-heated crystals in a vacuum and then slowed down time, shards of wood slowly being consumed by marine and indigo ambers filled the air. Reflecting upon the sweaty skin of red and the repellent oils of feathers.

  
Blitzo’s face was suspended in darkness, as the unnatural sources of light floated mostly above him. Only his eyes- those wide-spread and wild eyes of starved desire and unhesitant want blazed brightly and cast traces of yellow glow that were caught and reflected by his exposed teeth. He was breathing heavily, yet not for a lack of breath or the need to catch it. Only to provide his body with the oxygen it needed- demanded out of him for the deed ahead. It caused Stolas’ smile to crawl higher across his face, abandoning any traces of dignity and formality in favour of perverse glee. One which triggered Blitzo into a frenzied snarl of conflicted distaste and arousal, his head shooting forward to sink sharp teeth into the feathery shoulder and neck of his lanky lover, silencing the giddy sips of air with an unintentionally loud moan.

  
The smaller of the two spent a good few minutes just ruffling the other. Biting and nibbling with playful assertion, thrusting fingers counter-plume to stroke the thin and fragile limbs beneath, all whilst unknowingly thrusting his desperate erection in response to feathers tormenting it with light tickling and touch. Rubbing his own scent and musk into the stomach and chest feathers, disorganizing and disturbing them further with the slick moisture of natural lubrication. Only when Stolas was reduced to a whimpering pile of spaghetti-limbed putty, did the imp scoot backwards down his passionate prey. Stolas was in no shape or form exhausted as much as overstimulated, once more being reminded without the need for it as to WHY he had originally insisted on frequenting Blitzo in his bed….  
A second reminder soon shot into him mercilessly, causing his lengthy neck tilt almost ninety degrees as his head shot towards his shoulder in unprepared twitching. The imp had clearly reached his limits on foreplay, now little but a waist-high monster intent on relieving himself with his mate. His naturally scrawny frame bejewelled by the straining muscles of a fighter and runner, highlighted further by the diminished but still present shards of dematerializing door. His disproportionately large and unforgivingly strong hands holding Stolas’ long legs widely apart by the upper joint, thumbs folded into the bend to limit any attempts at resisting. Not that Stolas so wished, but in his current state the thrill of powerlessness shot through him as he looked down to the imp spearing him… he had been reduced into such passionate willingness and submissive delight, his body so delightfully pained by strain yet without strength from stimuli… as it was, if magic was taken out of the equation, Blitzo was the one in power.

  
The imp was letting lose a stuttered, hissing sigh. He had long since lost track of time, but it felt like an eternity since his erection stiffened to when it was finally enveloped in tight and moist warmth. He did not know if all of Stolas’ race functioned the same way or if the Prince had modified himself through magic, but he also had never cared to find out. Demon biology was a fucked-up and inconsistent topic as it was without the involvement of reality-bending finger waggling. All he knew and all that mattered in the moment was the crude and crass reality of it all: He could pound it like a pussy. Having refilled his lungs and relived himself of some deep-reptilian shivers, he slowly leaned his head forward and again and doubled the power of his grip of Stolas’ legs. That would be all the indication he would offer the bird about what was about to happen, and somewhere in the far-back corner of his mind he registered that Stolas sunk his fingers deep into the mattress for support the second after… it was all he needed.

If the first thrust had been desperate and dominant, the second was water-testing. He had been half-way deep and only pulled out a few inches before thrusting back in again, as if the ‘cold’ outside the avian’s sex startled him. He knew somewhere in his spine that he could never empty out his entire length into Stolas at once early on, it took some time warming and stretching the bird up… but there was still that deep-rooted and unthinking masculine drive to try anyway! The impulse to breed the moaning mess before him, to sink as deep as possible to ensure as high odds as possible for a well-delivered load. He glared down briefly. Pride swelling in his chest along the rising of his mouth’s corners into a pleased grin at the already visible bulge. Granted, Stolas was a walking amalgamation of feathers and sticks, but whenever Blitzo had nothing else going for him in his life… he had always been blessed in ONE department. And the now gape-beaked bird clutching a hand across his eyes knew it better than anyone…

  
Blitzo thrust again, this time pulling against Stolas’ legs to force himself deeper by another inch or so, before anchoring himself by straining his legs! The result was Stolas’ lower half being lifted in a sloping angle from the force applied, a shocked hoot echoing out through the room as his body went from shivering in pleasure to quivering. Blitzo tossed one of the legs to the side as he hoisted the other one closer to himself, wrapping an arm around it to lock it against his chest before the double knee folded over his shoulder. Locking him against it in return. With his freed hand, he grasped hard against the already significantly lengthy bulge burrowing its way further up his plumed mid-section and belly! Clamping down around the stretched bird and the throbbing dick that filled him, causing the neighbours to be reminded of Blitzo’s existence as his name was shrilly shrieked at a decibel level only the vocal cords of a bird can produce.

  
“I swear I’ll fuck you PREGNANT this time…!” Blitzo’s eyes were hard-shut from the effort of holding up Stolas’ lower half at the awkward angle, yet the weight and pressure applied to his privates were too satisfactory for him to succumb. He continued to thrust, against and again, sinking his teeth into the sprawling and twitch-taloned leg held against him if only to further vent and apply dominance. Grinning to himself briefly as he felt Stolas’ orgasm swell and lubricate around his member, pausing briefly at full insertion to rub the stretched hide and internals with his hand. Running circles with his thumb against a nubby spot that he knew to be Stolas’ freaky little birb-dick hidden in the depths of his cloaca, having once been told that the Royal mated like peacocks but did not know what such creatures were…

  
Blitzo was however not done. Not by a long shot… He continued holding on to Stolas’ leg and thrusting himself deep into the now runny opening, the last of the fizzing door fragments reflecting in the clear liquids spurting and seeping out of the avian depending on the rhythm of thrusts. He was fully inside, and Stolas’ face was hidden by distorted energies… Where-ever the Prince was mentally, Blitzo did not fully know. Distant and echoing ringing of moans, his name, the word yes, what he could only assume was ancient Greece or Latin and the occasional praises would fill the room. So he knew Stolas was still ‘there’, even if his ecstatic state seemed to dislocate him mentally.

  
There were times where Blitzo could have sworn he was passionately kissing the avian royal, feeling and tasting his familiar tongue before opening his eyes- never realizing he had closed them to begin with, and finding the statically distorted Stolas still at lengths away. Fucking magic… he’d never understand it and it frustrated him, making him thrust harder or forcefully spin Stolas on his cock by switching legs, if only to counter with something he DID understand! Though he had a sneaking suspicion that the avian WISHED for such responses…

  
Eventually, Blitzo felt the growing pressure rise within him. The sensation of swelling and bloating- of muscles directly connected to the production of rewarding hormones awakening fully after a lengthy and promise-filled session… He dropped Stolas’ leg and grasped his lover with both hands, holding him up by his back as his legs fell on each side. He began thrusting more rapidly, more erratically and without predictable rhythm. Following the twitchy impulses born from the pleasantly unpleasant cancer growing and burning below his abdomen, the perverse pleasure of discomfort that promised such familiar and euphoric delight if he could only appease it correctly..! He snarled, the process always reminded him of cracking safes… There was precision needed despite the overwhelming sensation of pressure and stress! An unsatisfactory angle or strength of push would feel like it set him back to the start, just like the code of the dial… he just needed to…

  
The shiver shot up through his spine and tail, making both curl backwards in an attempt to force as much raw and additional length of himself into his partner as possible! His grip on stolas’ back shifted to that of his hips, straining against them with all of his might to ensure his lover would not slip or fall away from him, as lengthy shot after lengthy shot emptied itself into the cramped depths. Blitzo had lost count on if Stolas had climaxed twice or thrice, but he knew as he felt another familiar cramping and wet pressure counter the loads he unleashed that it was now at least three times… a good effort, he thought to himself, as his body immediately began registering exhaustion and soreness. Yet he remained standing, lengthy twitch and flex of unload after the other, until the relief and pleasure from the undone knot of swelling at his core was all he could feel.

  
With knees folding beneath him, his length still safely buried in the now swollen and slightly rounded belly of his twitchy and unresponsive partner, Blitzo grinned. “Damn, stolas… did I finally dick you to death?” He collapsed face-first into the wildly ruffled torso, his stomach and chest curled over the wobbly and protruding result of his work. It made Stolas gasp from the pressure applied too it, before softly cooing in delight of his high as warm hands began to stroke and massage it… he could practically hear the sloshing… and it must show on his face as his relaxing state made it visible once more, for he could certainly hear Blitzo slowly dozing-off snicker, before both of them surrendered to a much-needed rest.

Blitzo was the first to awake as parental panic stirred inside him. The rhythmic screaming of his phone was that of Loona calling him, which sent immediate awareness of the mess they had made and how visible they would be from the lack of a bedroom door to his mind! He was unaware of how long he had slept ontop of his swollen- almost beer-bellied bird boyfriend, but the refreshing after-effect of long-pent relief and a midday nap was more than enough to have him alert in a second.

  
“… Fuck.” He stated, before looking down to Stolas- who had NO rights looking so adorably at peace and happy as he did, not that Blitzo would ever tell him that to his face! He quickly made sure to memorize the visual to secretly treasure it, before gently slapping him awake. “Stolas… Stolas! The girls! That must be Loona calling ahead! They could be here any minute!”

  
He had to repeat himself almost word-for-word as Stolas was a FAR slower at sobering and awakening than the alert-natured imps. But once the words had landed, it took only a few seconds of processing before Stolas went from a sex-drunk lovely-dovely cuddle-dove to a frantic parent once more! Sitting up with such force that he suddenly felt nauseous- his wobbly core making him pause and blush with a wide and lovingly perverted smile… he allowed himself a couple of seconds to tenderly run his gingerly fingers across the visual gravidity, before throwing himself out into the apartment to help Blitzo with repairs and cleaning magically.

  
Even with Stolas’ spells, the two only barely managed to restore the apartment to its previous and recognizable state before Loona kicked open the front door with a snarl, shouting for why Blitzo had not answered and helped them carry their shit up to the apartment from the cab. Of course… in their haste, the bedroom had been left for later cleaning and was concealed with a brand new door. One that Stolas had literally stolen magically from a neighbour after making sure they were not home. And, more embarrassingly, they had both forgotten to do anything about Stolas… physical state, despite the quick freshening-up spell he had applied to them to remove scents and smells. When Octavia noticed, she had gone wide-eyed and asked just what the hell had happened to him, to which Stolas imploded into a blush fluster, but Blitzo stepped in.

  
Using the divorce and lawsuit papers restored to the kitchen table as a scapegoat for Stolas breaking down emotionally, to which Blitzo had offered him some weed to calm down but it had only resulted in the mother of all munchies… so the two had spent the day at that nearby restaurant where a very emotional and stoned Stolas had stuffed his face for several hours. Now being rather embarrassed about it. Stolas, in turn, used his gratitude to the quick-witted imp to overwrite his own will to choke and silence him for the audacity of his lies. But, it was also FAR better than what he could have come up with himself… especially since he had almost never lied in all his life… it did not help that Octavia completely BOUGHT the story and embraced her father to try and comfort and offer sympathy, stating she was sorry over him having to hide his emotions around her, and that she was glad that he vented and tried to deal with it.

“…. I am still not certain if I am thankful or angry with you for earlier, you know?” Stolas proclaimed silently as they pulled their shared blanket over them that night.

  
“Should I have told her that she hugged a cum-belly instead?” Blitzo smirked in response, knowing without seeing that the bird next to him blushed with a frown.

  
“You know VERY WELL that you should not have! But I am not happy with how natural it came for you to lie to my daughter… I will admit it all turned out well, however it still rubs me the wrong way.” Stolas’ gaze wandered away from the imp and into the darkness around them, accidentally ‘bumping’ into the now reduced but still visible swelling beneath the blanket.

  
“… I won’t apologize for it, it is second instinct and bullshitting has saved my hide many times. But if it helps, I’d never lie to her about something actually important. I just didn’t see the truth being valuable or beneficial for her. Would she have profited or grown from knowing the truth about what we do in private?” His voice was factual, yet with a hint of being apologetic. It was clear to Stolas that the idea of lying to one’s daughter hit home with the imp.

  
“No, no it would not. And I do realize that. Honestly, I am impressed with how quickly you could spin something believable enough in such a short time. I realize that had it been anyone but Octavia, I would likely have delighted in your cleverness and adaptability, so mayhaps it is unfair of me…”

  
“Fuck you. We are MEANT to be unfair to our daughters, Stolas. That’s the difference between Dads and Fathers, you know?” Blitzo looked to the (now very) distant ceiling and snarled.  
“… what do you mean, Blitzy?” Stolas turned to him with a perked eyebrow.

  
“Anyone can be a father. It is just the name of the aftermath. Guy fucks chick, kid gets born, guy gets title of Father. That is his role, no matter if he is good or bad- or even hated for it, he will always BE the Father. But Dads? Dad is the name our kids GIVE to US. When they reach for us, ask for us, question us, talks with us… when they WANT us to be their father. If we do not WANT to treat them differently and better than random fuck-shits on the streets, we don’t deserve to be called Dads.” Blitzo huffed, crossing his arms with an unreadable face.

  
“… I never thought of it that way…” Stolas vanished into his own world, remembering the relationship he’d had with his Father… one he had been made to address as such, or by name since an early age. Like most of his relatives- as was the norm in said era, everything was very business professional. Cold, stiff, polite. ‘Dad’ or ‘Daddy’ was something a peasant would call their fathers, and it was considered a dirty word… but, had those children not also looked happier…? Often playing with or competing with their father figures? He had almost forgotten WHY it had been so important to him, years ago, to ALLOW and ENCOURAGE Octavia to call him ‘Dad’, despite Della’s many objections on the matter… “… OUR daughters?” Stolas suddenly blinked.

  
“… well… yeah…?” Blitzo immediately shrunk down into his folded arms, his gaze anywhere but Stolas at the moment. “I mean… come on, you know what I mean!” Embarrassed and flustered, Blitzo glared angrily at Stolas for noticing his accidental phrasing. Stolas, in turn, only smiled warmly and adoringly. Tears slowly welling up in his eyes as he reached out and pulled the imp closer into a loving embrace.

  
“Maybe I do… one day you will have to say it so I truly do, but I think I do… and thank you.” Stolas felt the imp hug him back strongly after his words, his chest pressured by a curl-horned forehead and face burying itself into it. Blitzo felt such shame in that moment. Such hot, burning and destructive shame that he would not fall asleep even after Stolas breathing slowed into a steady rhythm and his arms grew limp. He hated himself. He hated himself for being such a coward. For being unable to SAY what he meant because he was AFRAID of it…

  
He hated himself for how much it reminded him of HIS father… of the times before Stolas where he had had something and lost it, all because of his cowardice… He spent the night mouthing three words over and over, always unable to even whisper them, and he hated himself for it…


	4. Chapter 4. I promise.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> With the date for Stolas divorce trial approaching rapidly, Blitzo finds himself a bit more on edge. Especially when boots get chewed up by plants and his bitchy employees overstep their boundries! However, the trial must go on! It is Blitzo and Stolas against a courhouse filled with the ancient families of Hell's Elite... the first Royal Divorce in afterlife history... and then another surprise!

I.M.P; Intimate Messy Parentalhood. Chapter 4. I promise.

“FUCK-MOTHERING MOTHER-FUCKER!!!” Blitzo roared at the discovery of his second black cowboy boot… or rather, the chewed-up remains. He had spent a good eternity of 30 increasingly long and aggravating minutes looking for the blasted thing, called Stolas FOUR times to ask if he was SURE he had not seen it- or worse yet, borrowed it before going out shopping. Now that he found it, he was fuming with pent-up stress and frustration over turning the whole apartment upside down multiple times in his crazed search… only for Stolas’ fucking pet PLANT to have secretly been CHEWING on it this whole time! He had ran past the fucking thing at least twenty times!! And now he could barely recognize the crumpled, acid-worn and multi-punctured chunk of leather…

  
“God fucking damnit… these were my FAVOURITES, you photosynthesis fleshlight!” He gave the beachball-sized head of the still young carnivorous plant a slap with the high rim of the mutilated footwear, making it hiss and retract from him. He took some comfort in that the apparent smile between its multiple sets of eyes warped away, but refused to do it any real harm… as much as he wished to! In the month since Stolas got it, apparently a surviving sapling from his personal garden salvaged from the post-Stella-ruins, Blitzo had been told that a firm hand was permitted and encouraged, but no excessive violence. Lest it turn aggressive and untrusting. Which was fine with the imp, but a few more slaps would feel so rewarding…!!! “… You are LUCKY your pot-planting-papa’s plump posterior is where -I- plant my pole after potting up… Stupid sexy Stolas and his stupid snappy spruces…” Blitzo grumbled to himself, turning away from the dedicated table in the living room where the plant was established, only to pale. There was Stolas…

  
“I do not know about ‘stupid’, my dear Blitzy… but I am pleasantly surprised that our shared little pet plant is someone you can open up and confine with.” There was a delighted smirk on the towering avian’s face as he carefully closed the door behind him with a leg- his talons gripping the doorknob with deadly ease and grace, guiding it shut with unnatural silence before he put down the two bags of groceries he had been carrying. “… PLUMP posterior, for that matter?” There was a sharpness to his voice, yet not without amusement or sultry undertone. Especially as he straightened himself up from the bags with an elegant curl of his lanky figure, jutting his lower half to the side with a hand rested upon it in an almost comically saucy stance. “Are you calling me fat, dear?”

  
“Tsk…” Blitzo took a moment to act tough to snap himself out of his awkward startle, having not expected his live-in boyfriend to be back so soon. Least of all walk in on him like so. “Quit acting so snooty. If you DID fatten up a little I’d still bask you like a turkey on the regular.” His snarl grew a cocky twist to it at the slight puffing of feathers and blush on his scandally clad partner. Blitzo had learned several things about Stolas over the years, but even more under the near two months they had spent under the same roof. One, he suffered from an over-active imagination, which is what made him very verbal and pervy if left to his own devices… but it also worked against him when throwing curveball flirts and threats with a creative spin or peculiar choice of words at him, as it would trigger all kinds of images in his head. Two, he liked to be proper and dapper, but actually hated the confining clothes of nobility. Stolas was proud over being and feeling attractive, using every chance he could to dress in commoners’ clothing or roleplay outfits. The slummy clothing stores of Imp City suited him just fine, as it was a highway of crotch-cut jeans and deep-ring tops. “Besides… if we put some fluffing on your muffin, it would cover up the stuffing~” He said with a sideways shit-eating-grin and a light thrusting of his hips, eyes locked on Stolas’ stick of a stomach… followed by a bouncy wiggle of an eyebrow.

  
Exactly 0.314 seconds later, Blitzo regretted his life choices and cackled in victory as Stolas- a blur of limbs, feathers and immense red eyes, swooped him in such perfect predatory silence that the imp could practically hear the frenzied heartbeat of his lover before they impacted with the wall. The room filling with heated moans echoed by the other’s mouth and the kisses between them. Stolas with blushing bright red, his eyebrows furrowed downwards in indignation over the insolence of this mere imp… but mostly over how badly the phrasing and attitude totally did it for him!

  
“You horrid, obscene, foul-mou-mmmmf… dirty, disgraceful, degenerate- mmf-mmmm… pah! Slum-dwelling, cocky, brutish, insulti- mmrrRRR!! Hmmm… AH! You MONSTER!” Stolas panted, having already forgotten if he was insulting or complimenting the smaller man he held against the wall… the smaller, reptilian man who knew his every button and had already dialled him in for a frenzied quicky in the morning. Something about their new life together completely threw off their perception of time regarding sex… Where as before they could go a month in-between, only feeling pent up the last few days but otherwise satisfied- admittedly Blitzo more so than Stolas, now? It was but three days ago that Blitzo had quite literally fucked Stolas THROUGH THE ROOF! Well, ceiling. And it was more of a very deep crater in a material not intended for gravitational polarity change- Stolas idea for that matter, but by all the wisdom of Bagdad if he had not FELT it be through the roof! THREE DAYS! And all it took was this infernal little Imp to look at his dirty, spit a few raunchy phrases and hump the air… and they would both be in heat like hormonal teenagers!

  
“Hey, hey hey hey, wait, Stolas!” Blitzo forced his blank-eyed boyfriend to pause and blink, beak still open and lightly smeared with joint saliva. The imp quickly grabbed him by the back of his head, pulling him in closer with a wide grin before whispering: “Gotta tie a knot on my turkey’s throat, lest all the stuffing seep out when the core taunts…” He closed his mouth across Stolas’ neck and throat, the thin biology of the royal demon allowing him to gently sink his teeth over it and wrap his serpent-like tongue around it! Feeling the owl shudder and draw a ragged breath of air in renewed and doubled excitement. Blitzo well aware that images of Stolas laying on his back, coaxed and stuffed to such a brim that it was seeping out the corners of his dopey-smiling beak was flashing by his mind… the reason for his twin sets of knees shaking and his irises shrinking down to invisible dots on his red disc-like eyes… before Blitzo kicked off the wall and forced them both down into the nearby sofa. Both their clothes flying off in literal shreds as they unravelled each other like presents on Christmas morning! And oh, they were BOTH gonna deserve coal after this… ~

“THREE. HOURS. Sir! You had us waiting THREE HOURS for you to pick us up! We could have walked to the office TWICE in that time!” Moxxie snarled at Blitzo, who was seemingly ignoring him with a perfectly blank expression as he navigated the chaotic streets in the company van. “There are these things called PHONES! You know, the thing you utilized to call ME and accuse me of breaking into YOUR home to steal a singular boot? Which, may I remind you, is you projecting your own invasion of privacy onto others! AGAIN!” The young, shorter imp hissed through grinding teeth, his wife next to him only snickering. Ever the peppy optimist foil to her anxious husband, she gave him a light pat on the shoulder with an amused smile.

  
“Oh come now, Mox… I r’member you loosin’ the keys and wouldn’ even leave the house ‘til you found them.” Her bodily contact, warm smile and southern drawl momentarily defused the round-headed young male, an earnest smile forming on his lips from her comfort and reasoning… before a sharp turn tossed him against the window and reminded him of his boss’ existence.

  
“Yes, but that was a safety matter! We could have been robbed! Or locked out! HE claims to be THREE hours late looking for a BOOT when he has other shoes! AND THEN…” Moxxie raised a finger with dramatic slowness, his left eye twitching. “AND THEN, he has the gall to call in SICK in ADVANCE and leave all work to US when he is perfectly HEALTHY?! What sane individual would NOT have an issue with this display of utter lack of professionalism?! It is like he does not even CARE!” The white-haired imp threw his hands into the air, before being jolted in his seatbelt from the car suddenly spinning into a resting position. Snarling, he tugged at the door handle to exit and finally get to work, but a second too late. The safety sounded through-out the car the moment his fingers made contact with the polished aluminium, preventing anyone but the front-seat driver to exit.

  
“Uhm, Moxx…?” Millie tapped on her husband’s shoulder as he tugged the doorhandle to double-check, earning him an eyebrow-perked gaze over his shoulder which she re-direction to the window. He blinked. This was NOT the company parking lot. Blitzo had somehow managed to spin and slide the van deep into an alleyway, bricks and mortar surrounding them on both sides with so impressively little space between walls and vans that it briefly stunned the younger male. He often did completely forget about the discomforting amounts of unknown skills that resided behind his boss’ carefree and childish tendencies. He would never admit it openly, but the way Blitzo handled the multitude of guns, weapons, vehicles, paperwork, clients… he was clearly capable, just unorthodox and mentally damaged. A dangerous combination.

  
“… Sir?” Moxxie uttered, cautiously, as he peered diagonally between the front seats to the darkened scowl on Blitzo’s face. His eyes neither bright nor luminescent as per usual, or even radiant as when he was angry or passionate… they were dimmed. Less fiery orange and more grape-juice red in front of a muffled candle. “I-… s-sir?” Moxxie blinked. Why did he stutter? What was this sensation of alertness? His breathing felt forced, as if he could not trust his body to do it without manual input. He could feel his heartbeat in his fingers, a tightness in the skin across the back of his head that pulled in his ears. Wait, why was he focusing on this? No, rather… he couldn’t focus. It was all just brief analysis from being too easily distracted. The slightest movement of his seemingly same-situated wife sent his own heart racing and breath into stutter… oh sweet merciful Broadway, they were scared? The realization had his eyes dart back to Blitzo with newfound concern and notion of motion. The grimly dim eyes meeting his through the ceiling-mounted mirror. They lacked any noticeable emotion, which only increased Moxxie’s heartbeat. For two orbs of such a warm and passionate colour to come across so cold… so unfeeling… as if they were fuelled with a dampened fire that could re-ignite at any moment, but without the civilized hinders to holster and restrain the flames once they erupted.

  
“… care to repeat that, employee three?” Blitzo’s voice was calm and casual, but his choice of words alongside his unblinking and unfeeling gaze sent shivers down Moxxie’s spine. ‘Employee Three’ was a reference to back when Blitzo still struggled to tell Moxxie and Millie apart by names, but in the current context it felt horrifying to have any personal relationship, experience and memory between them removed. When he could not respond, only stare back and squeeze the hand of his wife a little harder, Blitzo continued. “I am many things. Almost all of them are bad. As if being born in hell was not enough, I was raised on a circus. Expecting anything else from me is a pleasant little upper-class pipedream for pastry-baking snobs still complaining over having to do an average man’s cultural job, rather than perform and pamper for an even higher elite of snobs.”

  
Moxxie felt a waft of shame wash over him. It was NOT like Blitzo to talk like this. The older imp had no issues going personal, but it was almost always on that comical level of OVERLY personal that was easy to shrug off, even for Moxxie. Just banter. But this…? Moxxie came from a family serving royalty similar to that of Stolas. He had grown up close to and near higher sophistication, education and entertainment than he knew was commonplace… a luxury most imps can never dream of, a start in life so unfair that he had almost been killed out of envy for it multiple times. If not for Millie… hell, if not for Blitzo even, being as acceptive and tolerant of what he KNEW to be whining… he only did it because he knew they COULD do better, wanting to improve and better, but…

  
“However…” Blitzo continued, his eyes slimming a tad. “There is one thing I am not. Calling me what I am is fine and dandy, Number Three. I can take that, I can joke about that, I can retort and fence with that. I can admit to having strokes of cruelty. That I give you a lot of shit. Expose you to things that toughens you up- or Satan forbid, teaches you to stand on your own instead of expecting your wife to carry your ass. In half a year I turned you from a pencil-pushing pastry-poker to a rope-swinging marksman. When was the last time you felt insecure on the streets? Like you could not walk up to a bunch of taller demons and tell them shit?”

  
Moxxie shrank. He had always been a good boy when young, never needing a sit-down like some of his siblings of fellow servant-born. He was small, but by all that is holy had he never FELT as small as he did then and there. He had not thought about it. Not considered how he had changed and grown from Blitzo’s employ and treatment. Sure, certain days at the office was hell and frustration, but he was right. It had been a long, LONG time since Moxxie felt truly afraid. He was accustomed to weapons, not just carrying a few at all times but knowing how to wield them with deadly accuracy and steady hand. Come crisis or surprises, he had proven himself capable of adapting on the spot. Especially if his wife faced danger or injuries. It was… not something he could ever see himself even conceive before I.M.P. It was the stuff of dramas and theatre, not something for a scholarly imp servant in his mid-20’s… he was still a child by many others’ definition.

  
“Un-fucking-caring…” Blitzo tasted the letters, his gaze lowering itself to view the void between himself and the front window. “I won’t tolerate being called that. Feel free to think of me however the fuck you want, Mox. But if that is how you feel of me truthfully, then I expect your resignation letter on my desk come evening. I’ll give you a letter of recommendation, for what it is worth, and I’ll see if Stolas still has that friend in need of staff. Been a year since we spoke about it last, but I asked him to keep an eye out for such, should I be done in on the job. But I guess this hits close enough to be the same… Gonna need some time, though. Reason it took three hours was because I needed that time to calm him down. He is going to Lucifer’s court next week over the divorce procedures- first of its kind, what with him being royal and all, and the matter of his daughter. It is why I need time off, to go with him…” Moxxie’s heart sunk… then ached…

After that, Blitzo had started the van and made his way out of the alleyway- zero scratches through disturbing display of motor vehicle control, and on to the office parking spot. The ride had been perfectly silent and the older imp had calmly turned the engines off and exited the car without sound or notion. Millie and Moxxie remained within it, the latter of which staring into the upholstery of the passenger seat before him. Blitzo had never once joked about firing either of them. He had never even hinted to the concept, no matter what happened or what was said. For him to explain the situation so black and white, that he would sooner have Moxxie- and by association Millie, leave the company than have employees that thought honestly of him as uncaring…? Moxxie knew that his boss WAS caring. Overly so, if anything, just easily distracted. And for as harsh as he could be- still far from as cruel as most demons, mind… he would risk health, life and reputation if anyone messed with his employees… his self-proclaimed family… which made it feel so uncomfortably real and safe, most days. And then his relationship with Stolas? Royal divorce court and management of the daughter? Fuck… he never even gave Blitzo a chance to explain before going off on him, did he…? He leaned forward, elbows on his knees with a miserable look on his face.

  
“… I messed up, didn’t I?” Was all he could say, before a lithe hand came to rest on his back. He could feel his wife’s mournful expression and nod, more so than see it. He closed his eyes hard. “… I should apologize… shouldn’t I?” The hand on his back patted him softly, and he could have sworn the very air itself grew warmer alongside what had to be the proud, loving smile of his wife. He sighed, feeling his own smile crawl forth meekly. “… he forgot the door safety on too, didn’t he?” Millie began to snicker awkwardly, forcing her husband to join in with a pained smile of unwanted amusement.

It would take months before either Blitzo, Moxxie, Millie or Loona understood where the sudden boom of high-end clients and trust in the company sprung from, following the trial between Stolas and Stella. Blitzo had noticed no shortage of surprised stares at him from the various high-society representatives and relatives of the royal bloodlines, not to mention their carefully bred and trained-from-birth professional assortment of security and bodyguards. Most of them showing up with entire entourages of agents and brutes. After all, having that many demons from the highest tiers of the food chain attend the same busines? One involving family lines disputing over honour, legalities and marital matters? It would be suicide to risk one’s own potent blood in such a powder keg of powerhouses. Most or all of which competing for wealth, status and inheritance amongst and between each other. And then… there was Stolas. One of few Princes of Hell, second highest rank spare only the man he was second-hand to; Lucifer himself… General of Hells armies and the safekeeper of secrets that could crumble empires and bloodlines both living and buried… the price on that bird’s head was beyond mortal comprehension, and the old Owl knew it… especially since HE was the reason for the trial in large parts. First in all of hell’s long history (amongst royalty, at least) to demand a DIVORCE from one of the most esteemed families there were! And yet… despite all that, despite all the weight on his shoulders and the attention from a thousand ancient and power-hungry competitors and their divisions of protection…  
One. Singular. Imp.

  
One of the lowest classes in all of hell, known for their near complete lack of magical potency and small frames… yet he put all that he was; life, health, rank, reputation and secrets calmly and trustingly in the hands of that one Imp? Stolas was the lord of secrets. General of Hells Armies. What did the old bird know about this apparent nobody imp that they were all missing…? Was it a ploy? A distraction?! Did he already have them surrounded? Was this a coup? It had the entire courthouse on pins and sweaty needles through-out the trial. However, when nothing happened, a dreadful insight began to creep into their minds, followed by rumours that would never truly die down. Stolas had really JUST shown up, no overthrowing or assault or anything… with that one imp eternally by his side, sunglasses down and a single one-bullet Flintlock on his hip? That one imp represented something so powerful that Stolas felt no need for additional protection. The imp- Blitz, was it? Had he not looked a bit… off? Yes, surely he had! The size of his horns spoke of a lifespan far longer than your average imp. Oh yes, indeed they did! And did you see his height? Few imps can compare to that. His hands, too… those were hands used to weapons and melee, certainly! But, my dear, the most dreadful of all… did you notice how impeccably calm and uncaring he was? Despite ALL of our presences?! The entire ensemble of Hell’s most powerful did not even phase him! The old bird knows something… has seen something! Surely… After all… the Stella incident at the end? Do not speak of it! I thought my heart stopped when he retorted to Lord Lucifer that way…!

  
However, it would still be months before the rumours reached Stolas, followed by Blitzo who then went on to laugh himself into a three day voice-loss. Stolas swearing high and low that the imp grew another half-foot in those days from his ego inflating his spine, but it was also intoxicating having that blazing confidence and wordless silence spontaneously sweep the lithe bird off his feet with naught but a growl, grin and hungering glare… Before all that, though… the two had made it to the hotel at which they rented a room, following the trial. Due to the nature of hell’s volatile royalty, the vast majority of the legal matters had been settled or prepared way ahead of the trial itself, lest risk drag it out and force all those members from rivalling and competing clans to share courthouse for days on end like the olden times. Instead, these matters were settled almost exclusively by Lucifer himself and his closest advisors. Of which Stolas belonged to, but of course could not be taken in due to principles. It was a matter revolving HIM, after all.

  
No, the time in the courthouse had simply been witness testimony and confessions. A chance to present in person before the royal families one’s own side of the story to counter the rumour mill, as well as maybe influence Lucifer’s final decision. It had been a landslide victory, however. Not only because Stolas had an impeccable reputation and long life of service and furthering of the royal families influence and power. His occasional fling with commoners being such a time-worn commodity that no-one ever had or would have an issue with it. It had been stranger in that world if he did NOT. Stella, however… She had always been more hot-headed amongst others than what was deemed fitting for a Noble. She had done naught but lay a singular egg- ONE DAUGHTER for Stolas over their lengthy marriage, without any other redeeming qualities to her name but her heritage. Filling no purpose for the armies, politics, businesses or so on. Even in the courtroom she continued screaming and throwing a fit, trying to justify her attempted murder of a born Prince of Hell, General of Hell’s armies and Lucifer’s right-hand man, by HIM being disgraceful? When, in fact, she was naught but a pretty face?

  
Blitzo had almost lost it when Lucifer, ever-calm and smiling little man that he was, presented his decision in melodious amusement. Explaining Stella for the insecure and insignificant little songbird that she was. That she only waved her ‘high society’ banner around because she had made nothing else for herself. How being born does not equate to greatness. How having a successful mother did not earn her entitlement. How she was the disgrace for providing nothing but a daughter she herself had made clear to treat as a disappointment. How he had hoped Stella would mature alongside Stolas and feel inspired by his achievements to strike out on her own, with all that fire and passion… rather than wither up into a bitter thrower of tea-parties and spender of money.

  
There was a gust of disbelief amongst the bleachers following that. Lucifer was a jovial and merry little man, making it rare for him to lay into someone so cold-heartedly and raw. Especially a woman. Lucifer was nothing if not easy-going on what he deemed the fairer sex. Old School would not cut it, the man was Ancient Lecture. He treated women like fragrant flowers to be admired and tended to with worship and admiration, to be let bloom and grow into their own beings- even if he disliked the colours and thorns some might acquire in the process. But let them grow and bloom, he did. Let them live how they wished, he did. But it was clear that he was still the lord of Hell’s Nine Circles for good reasons… for a spoiled brat of a housewife to lie, besmirch, insult, threaten and attempt murder on his second in command? One of the most capable, powerful and yet socially pleasant Princes in all of Hell’s history… just because he had a lover of lower class? Just because he had finally told her to go back to her own harem of lovers and leave him to his singular one, lest he file for divorce in preference of that one imp?  
Stella had snapped.

  
Her family as quick to abandon the courthouse as the guardsmen were to contain her, as the nothing-to-lose avian lashed out towards the man who had so publicly ruined and humiliated her… who had chosen a lowly, weaselly IMP from the SLUMS… ABOVE HER?! She was of NOBLE BIRTH! The red, mutated RAT-SPAWN was NOTHING and she would NOT be placed BENEATH HIM IN STATURE! Her screeching and attempted attacks only stopped once the doors closed, her voice quickly muffled by means unseen to the crowd. Stolas had sighed, the whole ordeal more taxing on him than anything else Blitzo had seen him go through over the years. But then Lucifer had sighed as well, before leaning slightly over the edge of his combined seat and podium, looking down towards the birb and the imp. He had apologized to Stolas for having to go through all this legal nonsense, and he had preferred to just stamp the application in green the moment it reached his desk. He knew Stolas, and he knew how unhappy he had been in his arranged marriage. Wishing he had done something sooner, but also not having wanted to meddle without spoken desire. Stolas had chuckled, bowed and stated that he was glad things were done according to norm and procedure. That being the first noble to divorce was spectacle enough, not needing it to be made worse by favourism.

  
Lucifer had smiled widely and laughed, as if the courtroom’s many other inhabitants were forgotten. As if it was just him and Stolas again, like in days long past. Commenting that, on the topic of spectacles, he was impressed with how quickly his imp companion had stepped between him and a raging soon-to-be-ex-noble, but at the time STILL a NOBLE.... Weapon drawn and trigger clenched, body-blocking Stolas like that. That had indeed been something new to behold! Something Lucifer did not say often, and truly meant as the height of compliment.

  
“Bitch, you ain’t seen nothing yet. She was one step from a piercing.” Blitzo responded unthinking.

“… you almost gave me a heart-attack, Blitzy… Saying something like that to Lucy in front of all those people… And you called him a bitch!” Stolas began laughing, exhaustion finally settling in as they settled into their hotel room, making everything ten times more hilarious than it needed to be. As well as making the bed ten times more comfortable than promised, which still said a lot for the top suite of Hell’s most extravagant hotel! Blitzo just grinned back to his partner as he hung up their clothes on an overly elaborated chair of gold-painted carved wood. Stolas having been too tired to do more than let his regal attire slid off him the moment they were in privacy.

  
“What? The old man laughed, didn’t he? I recognize a fellow smug asshole with refined tastes when I see one. Besides, Lucifer fathered us Imps in the beginning. Guess where I get it from?” He took a noble pose and pouted his lips with a scrunched face of exaggerated dignity, sending Stolas into a giggle-fit as he laid on his bed. The sheer audacity of his beloved imp was heresy of the highest order, both then and now! But Stolas could only love him all the more for it. An ignorant little ball of issues and attitude or not, he still HAD stepped in between himself and a ‘set-for-murder skank’ (as Blitzo had so generously summarized Stella after Lucifer began laughing at his moxie) for the sake of Stolas. Indeed blocking what he could of the lanky bird with his own body by instinct, which had just smelted the old owl’s heart into putty.

  
“You are impossible, you do realize? Everything about you… You are a mystery to me, dear Blitzy. However this happened, you and I? I do not understand it, but I do not wish to question it either.” Stolas chuckled with a hoarse voice, observing his imp remove his brand-new uniform and tug off the matching cowboy boots he had insisted on. They did look good on him, Stolas had to admit. His own little piece of the Wild West…

  
“… impossible, huh… yeah, I guess that’s me. Old ‘how the fuck did you get this far’ Blitz. Heh.” The imp hung up his jacket, pausing briefly with his hands still holding on to it. Stolas felt the mood change and- despite his exhaustion, felt a sense of concern over the distant gaze in Blitzo’s eyes as he peered into the velvet darkness of his suit jacket, before recovering. “Well, if everything else I do is impossible, I might as well keep on trying. Right? Only live once, and I’d rather die knowing I tried than wondering if I’d succeed, you know?” He chuckled before walking over to Stolas and sitting down on the bed next to him. “You doing alright, dear?”

  
“I-…” Stolas blinked. ‘Dear’? Blitzo never called him by actually sweet pet names… and never with such a sincere voice of concern. Following such a cryptic speech, too. “I am… shaken, certainly, it has been a craving and long day… but now I am concerned. Blitzy, what is the matter with you?” Stolas reached a hand to gently grasp Blitzo’s arm, to his surprise having a much larger imp-hand cup his and hold it tenderly. “I… Do not think me so self-occupied that I have not noticed the last week putting a strain on you. You have been on edge and in your own world, but also far more restrained and restricted. I understand that you are putting in effort for my sake, but what troubles you so? There is something on your mind, I can tell…” As Stolas looked to Blitzo, the imp first smiled tiredly before turning his gaze to the joint point of the floor and distant wall. Not answering directly, instead choosing his words for a few seconds.

  
“… Last names are funny, Stolas. We imps don’t really have them, partly because we’d not be allowed to by higher powers. Fine by me. I’d rather live and die as just Blitz. Short and snappy, you know? But you? Go-fucking-etia… Ye Olden Latin for Magic. Granted to your line of the family by his ivory highness himself for your spells and shit. The thirty-sixth bloodline Lucifer created out of seventy-two, but rose to dominance above the others. In a couple of generations, even replacing Bael, the first-born of Hell… That is some shit.” Blitzo chuckled, Stolas stared. When and how had the imp memorized all of this…? “Turns out, I am indeed impossible. Hashtag humblebrag. You know how that Bael guy died? Apparently, after losing most his influence and legions to your ancestors, he fled to the living world. Settling somewhere in modern China, back when it was just called the Orient. You have ANY idea how LARGE and VAGUE that shit-hole is? Because it is there that he got offed by this… Shem-happa-fapper-moshi-moshi guy.”

  
“Shem HaMephorash?” Stolas could only stare as he guessed based on his own historical knowledge. Baffled over Blitzo’s apparent insight in what SHOULD be a closely guarded secret, before realizing that much of such recorded secrets laid woven into the pages of his Grimoire… had Blitzo actually bothered reading the thing, rather than just use it as a tool? The same imp that struggled with anything not horse-related or comic-based..?

  
“Yeah, that guy! See? Nailed it.” The imp flashed a grin of self-awareness despite his words, relaxing the Prince a little. “Well, yeah. So Shem managed to track him down, mortally injure him and put an end to his bullshit of conquering the living world with what remained of his forces. But the world was not exactly mapped out at the time, so no-one knows where the fuck this all went down. Least of all were Bael slithered off before bleeding out. Especially since all that was documented was ‘somewhere in the Orient’… thanks Obama, great tip.” Blitzo let a hand run across his face in a tired gesture, before digging it into the pocket of his trousers and pulling out a small and humble-looking ring. Tossing it casually to Stolas who caught it despite his surprise. It looked like a regular golden ring, plain and simple… before Stolas’ eyes- all four of them, shot wide in realization. For it bore the smallest little insignia, so small that the mortal eye would miss it. One of two crosses meeting at the bottoms in an ancient symbol resembling that of distorted skull and an upside-down apple flower bud. Two sprouts like legs anchored in small circles, an ancient representation of having a foot in both the Living and Mortal world… He knew the ancient family symbol.

  
“… The Ring of Bael…” he whispered in low worship, before almost instinctively reaching a finger for the seal and applying the now out-dated but once standardized spell for sealing away magic, quickly feeling an overwhelming amount of energy radiate from the thing! Gemstones of forgotten origin and priceless clarity began growing forth from the gold as if it was molten, each of them functioning as an additional battery and prism for empowering the spells of the wearer further. Stolas could only gasp, for he knew where the ring came from. It had been created by Lucifer himself, later passed down from Lucifer to Bael as a corruption of the first tradition. Bael had never had a son of his own, dying in disgrace in the mortal world. The only pride he brought his father was the miasma of corruption that furthered chaos and twisted many mortal souls into selfish and evil desires.

“… How did you find this…?” Was all Stolas could ask, too mesmerized by the unrivalled beauty and power of the ring, which kept producing gemstones even then. Increasing in power by the second. Blitzo smirked and shrugged, attempting to down-play his two-year long process of snooping and digging and literal rat-killing.

  
“Would you believe me if I said a big part of the process was just injuring rats in historically cursed locations and follow where they scurried off to?” He began laughing with low mirth as Stolas snapped out of it and looked to him with a face of baffled disbelief over the artefact- lost to scholars and demons of all ages for hundreds of years… to be sniffed out by rats… But it being Blitzo, he was also not in such disbelief that he could NOT believe it. It was right up the imp’s alley to find a stupidly simple solution to an age-old riddle.

  
“… why did you go searching for it? And why are you giving it to me?” Stolas finally questioned, having sealed the gemstones and energies back into the now simple gold ring. Staring at it, rather than Blitzo, in fear over what the answer might be. What reason Blitzo could possibly have for unearthing one of the eighteen lost treasures of the underworld, after such a speech and after this long time spent together under the same roof. And why now? Right after the court in front of Hell’s whole elite. Why afterwards? Why not just present it to Lucifer then and there? Or use it for his own gains and goals? His business? Or any number of power-establishing conquests and purposes! Stolas looked up to Blitzo, who chuckled at him with an awkward look on his face.

  
“… there really is only ONE of this thing, right?” He asked cautiously.

  
“… yeees?” Stolas ask worryingly, perking an eyebrow.

  
“Good… you looked so scared for a moment I thought I went out and got a bad ring!” Blitzo laughed with relief, leaning forward on his knees and drawing in breath. All whilst Stolas glared at him in bewilderment.

  
“… BAD RING?! How could- what are you-… This is a priceless artefact and personal heirloom of Lucifer himself! In what world could even YOU fear this to be a bad ring?!” Stolas snapped, as if Blitzo had just insulted a family member. The imp recoiled and then looked insulted back.

  
“WH- Because you looked TERRIFIED of the thing! Not really the look you want on the face of the man you are proposing to, you know?!” He snapped back with a snarl. Stolas opened his beak to retort, when the full weight of the imp’s words struck his consciousness.

  
“… Pro-… propose…” He could only parrot blankly, his shoulders slumping and eyes widening as Blitzo gritted his teeth and blushed, clearly wanting to look away but maintaining grip on himself.  
“Y-YES… propose… The fuck else would I be giving you a ring in a hotel room after you FINALLY became legally available, dumb-fuck?”

  
“… you spent god-knows how long tracking down and excavating one of the eighteen lost treasures of the underworld… just to propose to me?” Stolas, still in a process of emotionally rebooting from shock, looked down at the ring in his hand. His four eyes as perfectly round as it, gently reflecting its visage with their mirror shine.

  
“… said in your book that it was one of a kind and everyone wanted it. All powerful and shit… a slim ring of gold, hiding a treasure trove of beautiful gemstones beneath its surface… I thought it was a good fit, you know? Fuck, I meant to be all romantic and shit about this…” Blitzo spat air slapped a hand over his face, nothing having gone as he had intended it, before his guts panged into a pained knot at the sound of Stolas crying his eyes out. “… shit… fuck, fuck fuck FUCK… I should have waited- or asked for a preference or-… fuck… I’ll… I’ll give you some spa-HEEEYS!”

Exactly WHEN the bed- likely as expensive as three full-year earnings on Blitzo’s part, had broken?  
Neither of them knew. Neither of them cared. In the hallway outside their door hung the corpse of an unfortunate employee who had used a staff key to let himself in, intending to investigate the source of noise complaint. He now hung on the wall, a bullet in his brains and a steel-hardened plume of gray bolting him stuck. Stolas and Blitzo had been left undisturbed in their love-making afterwards. All fifteen hours of it, followed by ten hours of rest. They now laid awake, basking in their sore hides, shared smells, aching joints and raw crotches. Just holding eachother, looking at one and other with a peculiar sensation of never-ending fascination. The room around them was trashed to splinters and shards. Blitzo did not even remember how or when the bananas from the fruit bowl got slimy and bruised, let alone why the sink had broken… but fuck it. Best lay of his life!

  
“… You do realize I could not possibly keep the ring, right? I must return it to Lucifer, but I am certain he will be VERY thankful for your efforts in relocating it. I doubt anyone has tried in over a hundred years.” Stolas let out a cooed chuckle, looking at the ring on his finger with adoration.

  
“Kinda figured… Don’t really care if old porcelain-cheeks puts it in his mansion or whatever, as long as I got to propose with it. He may hold it, but that ring is YOUR wedding ring. If he says otherwise I’m gonna have to call him more than a bitch for robbing MY husband.” Blitzo winked with a smirk that spoke of him meaning every single hieratical word he said… the last of which sent shivers and goosebumps through Stolas. For as many times he had made Blitzo refer to him as such through-out their passionate rampage, he doubted he would tire of it any time soon.

  
“Gather near, children. I shall tell you of the imp who rose from no-where to save the beautiful Prince from his wicked wife, retrieve the sacred artefact and challenge the Son of God himself into verbal fisticuffs over a minor political spat! It is the tale of Blitzo the Bewildering, the Brave, the Big-dicked mustang and the Bane of hotel furniture!” Stolas began to laugh alongside Blitzo, who could not help let out a guffaw at the idea and titles thrown his way. He pulled his bird in for another tender kiss, smirk still clad on his face.

  
“You think our daughters will kill us for this?” He snickered, gently rubbing the ring of Bael as he grasped Stolas’ hand. It was less so a question of concern and more of a merry wonderment of the full extent of their drama. The lanky prince chuckling at the idea.

  
“Well… Octavia has never been fond of her mother, even if I know recent event struck her hard. But she has been happier in this new life than I have ever seen her. And I know you two get along- there is even some respect in her for you… I am sure she is open the idea of a replacement mother!” Stolas grinned as Blitzo’s nodding head warped from that of warmth and tenderness to a more familiar sharpness of pep and frustration!

  
“MOTHER?! Now you listen here, you little shit! Just because you met me in a wig and I can pull off dresses better than your scrawny ass does NOT make me the MOTHER! I am DADDY of the castle, you hear me?! Say my name, you stupid sexy bird!” He had began to wrestle a limply struggling and laughing Stolas down into the ripped mattress once more, straddling him with a grin and pretend anger on his face.

  
“~Oooh, daddy!~”


End file.
